Port Adelaide
Coach – Ken Hinkley
2023 –
Points For – 3rd
Points Against – 12th
Top 5 Best and Fairest
- Zac Butters
- Connor Rozee
- Dan Houston
- Willem Drew
- Aliir Aliir
2023 Rising Star Noms
Nil
Ins – Thomas Anastasoploulos, Lachlan Charleson, Will Lorenz, Esava Ratagolea, Ivan Soldo, Jordon Sweet, Xavier Walsh, BZT
Outs – Nathan Barla, Riley Bonner, Trent Dumont, Xavier Duursma, Orazio Fantasia, Sam Hayes, Tom Jonas, Scott Lycett, Jake Pasini, Brynn Teakle
My Prediction
A lot of big predictions for the Power this year and there were times last year where they looked like they could achieve anything. They have retooled their backline and their ruck department as well as implemented another half arsed coaching handover with Josh Carr sitting in the back of the room waiting for Ken to make a mistake. It will not be boring at Port this year.
The backline was poor last year, they can talk up Aliir Aliir but he got found out consistently in the back half of last season as teams started playing through his man and he wanted no part of it. BZT comes in presumably to be a stopper and they have employed Esava to the role of looking amazing in patches and absolutely hopeless in others. Bergman, Houston and Burton give them very good disposers off half back.
The midfield is chock full of talent. You could make an argument for them to be the best midfield in the comp. JHF will get better again, Wines was down last year as they looked at his role but he is still a very good player, Rozee and Butters are brilliant game changing players and then they have depth with Farrell, Drew, Boak and Byrne-Jones. They don’t want for much in the middle, you could make an argument they don’t work hard enough defensively when things aren’t going their way.
The forward line works in part due to the talent they have and in part due to the amount of ball their midfield wins. Dixon is much maligned (drink) but also very important to the structure of this team. The last thing any team would want is to have Todd Marshall being rag dolled around their forward line due to not having stronger options. Georgiaides was down last year and they will be hoping for a bounceback from him. SPP will do SPP things which include kicking goals, bowling people over and putting stupid crap on social media. Rioli was a good pick up for them last year and another year in their system (and with all the bad stuff out of his) should see even better output.
The rucks are different but still not particularly good, Soldo is very average at the tap and just ok around the ground, they will be hoping Sweet develops and is able to take over at some stage. The coach has a pretty good record, he manages to be there abouts consistently without looking like nabbing a flag very often. A drop out of the top four may see him on the market.
Whilst there are some clear issues with their backline and potentially their rucks, the midfield is stellar and will win them a lot of games on the talent in there alone. I don’t think they are a premiership threat at this stage but if you can put yourself in the top four, then you give yourself a chance and they should definitely be in the top four. I think 2-4 is about the spot for them.
