Erin Phillips leads her side onto Alberton Oval for the first time. Image: Matt Sampson.

WE were there to see something new - the first Port Adelaide AFLW team to play on the national stage calling Alberton Oval home.

We felt something that was very old - and very true to the way of Port Adelaide, as a club and as a community, that has made Alberton Oval the spiritual home of the Port Adelaide Football Club since 1880.

As Port Adelaide senior AFLW coach Lauren Arnell noted on returning to the field for her post-match interview: "I am watching young girls and boys and their families back on Alberton ... " Just as it was when Port Adelaide AFLW captain Erin Phillips would run onto Alberton Oval after an SANFL match to join the kick-and-catch sessions among eager fans either collecting autographs or dream Magarey Medal votes as a "match winner".

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Dreams have been made on this spiritual ground for 142 years. They have been lived for more than a century.

Later, you could hear Barry Curtin's raspy voice working from the Bob Quinn Stand as reassuring sound waves across Alberton Oval for the after-match presentations ... just as it always was from the moment Bob McLean opened the new social club in 1969 and today is "The Precinct".

There were 5367 who came to Alberton Oval on Saturday to see something new in a match that had every ticket sold well before game day.

For many it felt like wearing an old shoe. Port Adelaide playing for national fame on Alberton Oval ... while retaining so much of what has always been Port Adelaide at Alberton Oval since 1880.

The man who asked - or suggested to - one of the field umpires: "Why don't you kick it for them (the Western Bulldogs)?" simply echoed a line that has been uttered across Alberton Oval for more than a century. Umpires have never drawn love from the terraces at Alberton.

The line-up along Queen Street to the Russell Ebert gates before midday was a reminder of when so many came early to Alberton Oval to get the best vantage spot for the first bounce at 2.20 on every second Saturday afternoon.

This time, first bounce was 1.10pm. We now live in an era of television times for football matches.

The tradition of Never Tear Us Apart has carried onto Alberton Oval for AFLW games. Image: Matt Sampson.

This time, the minute before the rucks clash for the opening bounce has Alberton Oval mirror Adelaide Oval for THE anthem - the Never Tear Us Apart statement, with club scarf raised and lungs emptied. NTUA sounds more passionate at Alberton. It is probably from the voices of the faithful not being drowned out by the superior public-address system at Adelaide Oval.

The anthem carries well across Alberton Oval, as noted with the Port Adelaide players who applauded at the end of this memorable rendition of one of the INXS hits.

Port Adelaide was at home on Saturday afternoon.

The decision made in 2013 to stay at Alberton rather than seek a new home on the city edge, at 1 Port Road, to be closer to Adelaide Oval has more and more merit today. Port Adelaide has been at Alberton Oval since 1880 (bar a tense moment with the local council for two years during the mid-1970s).

The ultimate vision for Alberton Oval will make a mockery of a recent newspaper columnist suggesting there will be a better home base for an AFL club in Adelaide, or any club - even a cuckoo bird that for the past three decades has repeatedly sat in the nests developed by others.

For those who have wanted Port Adelaide to adopt Alberton Oval as a home for national league games, the moment has arrived - and is leading to making Alberton Oval a place for greater honour for the local community.

For those who still debate why this could not have happened earlier, say in 2017 with the start of the national AFLW, have understandable frustration.

Port Adelaide's AFLW players and staff pose for a photo before their historic match at Alberton. Image: Matt Sampson.

But it needs to be remembered the landscape between 2015 and the launch of the national women's league was challenging on many fronts for the Port Adelaide Football and South Australian football in total. The politics of Australian and South Australian football can be exhausting, even in recalling their consequences.

Port Adelaide's commitment to women's football was evident at the start, as noted with the signing of Erin Phillips in 2015 when there was no more than an idea of a national AFLW that was to start in 2020 (not 2017).

Even earlier, by more than 12 months, Port Adelaide president David Koch put China on the agenda at the season launch at Adelaide Oval in March 2014. It began, as Koch declared that night of his China Strategy, as a pre-season game in Macau. It ultimately became the first AFL match played for premiership points outside Australia and New Zealand with repeat annual matches in Shanghai in 2017, 2018 and 2019 at Jiangwan Stadium until a worldwide pandemic closed the passage to the Silk Road.

In 2016, Port Adelaide could not have both - AFLW and China. In fact, it took a combined bid with South Australia and the Northern Territory to overcome the league's concern for the female talent base in Adelaide.

Today, Port Adelaide does have both. And is better on many fronts to support an AFLW team.

China has delivered the Port Adelaide Football Club the financial strength to bankroll three football programs (AFL, AFLW and SANFL) - and international exposure to generate major corporate backing to keep the football club more than relevant on the national stage and working in major areas of community pride and service. This too is part of the Port Adelaide mantra - We Exist To Win Premierships ... and to make our community proud.

There was much pride at Alberton Oval on Saturday afternoon.

The weather may have ruined the banner, but it couldn't ruin the moment. Image: Matt Sampson.

For a Port Adelaide team to walk off Alberton Oval with applause after defeat tells of a community that appreciates there is a new beginning at Port Adelaide. Phillips and her AFLW team-mates were strong in their work ethic, but clearly beaten by a better side in the Western Bulldogs. This was a moment of rare patience from a supporter base understanding Arnell's "inaugurals" have their apprenticeship to serve, just as John Cahill's AFL squads did in 1997 and 1998

Old traditions of demanding wins at home - of making Alberton Oval a fortress with team feeling a cold shiver as soon as they reach the Cheltenham cemetery - will come to be eventually.

Something new. Something old. Something very true to Port Adelaide traditions and Alberton Oval's history. "Herstory" is in the making; history is in the remaking.

Saturday, September 3, 2022 is to be remembered in Port Adelaide football folklore for much more than a football match, even a first of AFLW style. And, yes, the rain that wrecked the run-through banner produced by the cheer squad ruined a photo opportunity so many had anticipated for a long, long time. The footy gods have much to answer for.