IT'S building ... the promise, the expectation and the anticipation. The first W in W is wanted this weekend with Port Adelaide returning to Alberton Oval (Kaurna Country) to play another new entry to the AFLW, Sydney.
After three competitive matches against well-established AFLW teams - West Coast, the Western Bulldogs and Carlton - with two premiership points banked from the draw against Carlton at the weekend, Port Adelaide is favoured to collect its first W in W during the league's Indigenous Round. And it wants to honour captain Erin Phillips in her 50th AFLW game.
There is a fair bit on the plate for Lauren Arnell's "Inaugurals" while Port Adelaide files into Alberton Oval with a fair appetite to savour something new in their football program - and something old from the traditional Saturday afternoon at the club's spiritual base.
Port Adelaide's form line is certainly stronger than Sydney's - and is built on highly competitive matches against three well-advanced AFLW rivals. The biggest challenge for Port Adelaide is to find more reward on the scoreboard for its strong work ethic on the field.
Of the 12 quarters played so far in this 10-round home-and-away series, Port Adelaide has:
SCORED: NINE goals in four quarters - two in each of the second and third terms against West Coast at Mineral Resources Park in Perth in the season-opener; one in the second term against the Western Bulldogs at home in round 2; and a stunning four-goal surge in the second term against Carlton at Ikon Park on Sunday.
NOT SCORED: TWICE, in the last terms against the Western Bulldogs and Carlton.
MISSED: WITH 0.9 in the other six terms.
The challenge, after a fast-forwarded pre-season, two trial games and three AFLW championship matches, remains in building a second-nature understanding between the players, the three on-field zones and the attack now commanded by Phillips. It is a "work in progress" to watch progress at Alberton from 12.40pm on Saturday.
"We build consistency and connection each time we play," says Port Adelaide senior coach Lauren Arnell said. "It is the challenge of being a new team after 14 weeks together. So how do we build that connection in attack - it is progressing and it is developing each quarter.
"But you also have to pay respect to the opposition we play."
PROMISE
BUILDING the inaugural team was list manager Naomi Maidment's task at Alberton. The agenda was to build the inaugural 30-player Port Adelaide AFLW squad to be immediately competitive - and capable of driving sustained success.
To have two Rising Star nominations within the first three weeks of AFLW Season 7 - midfielder Abbey Dowrick in round one and forward-midfielder Hannah Ewings in round three - highlights the rushed entry to the national women's league (with the season's start advanced by five months) has not shortchanged Port Adelaide in its recruiting.
"Hannah has been highly touted for a couple of years," said Port Adelaide senior coach Lauren Arnell of the All-Australian from the 2022 under-18 national championships. "To see her by the way she goes about it - she is quietly spoken, but on the field Hannah lets her actions do the talking. Really strong. Smart with the footy, too. We know she will continue to get better."
"To be playing at this high level is pretty amazing. The hard work has paid off. Midfield is where I play my best footy when I get my hands on the ball and am composed with the footy. But it is the support around me from the girls that helps me, guides me through the whole game."
Rising Star Hannah Ewings, on her move to the midfield
ANTICIPATION
A quarter of century has passed since Port Adelaide lived with the anticipation of celebrating the first win in the AFL. It took three games ... with the first win against Geelong at Football Park in round 3, 1997. Port Adelaide's AFLW "herstory" seemed destined for a repeat at the weekend while the AFLW side was playing its third game on the national stage, at Ikon Park in Melbourne against Carlton.
So the opportunity to celebrate the first win among the faithful at Alberton Oval is to be treasured on Saturday afternoon.
It is a grand test of how a new group handles expectation - a theme that never subsides at the Port Adelaide Football Club.
"It would be incredibly special,” says captain Erin Phillips of the prospect of achieving the first W in W, particularly at home at Alberton.
"We had a massive crowd come to our first homegame at Alberton ... for people to get behind us, to get that first win would just be so, so special.
"It’s going to be an absolutely awesome game ... we’re looking for that first win (and it's) a great opportunity this week."
"As a club, (the mission statement) is 'Chasing Greatness'. To chase greatness, you have to be better every week. There are times when you get comfortable as an athlete. But you have to push the boundaries every week. That is what I am seeing in our group. Any Port Adelaide person will see that when the team runs out each time - constant improvement. And the right attitude. That is what I am seeing ..."
Port Adelaide senior coach Lauren Arnell
BROKEN MIRRORS
NOT even Alfred Hitchcock could have come up with such a script that has the challenges faced by Port Adelaide in the AFL in Season 2022 repeat in the AFLW.
Key forward Charlie Dixon was sidelined in the pre-season by ankle surgery - and a new-look attack spearheaded by Todd Marshall emerged. Port Adelaide's AFLW team is to play without star signing Gemma Houghton for the second time ... and opportunity opens for fellow Fremantle recruit Jade de Melo who was an energetic go-to forward at IkonPark at the weekend.
Lead ruck Scott Lycett's season was derailed by a shoulder injury ... and now AFLW ruck Liz McGrath is sidelined by a left-hamstring strain suffered late in the 27-27 draw with Carlton at the weekend after a stellar double-teaming battle with Olivia Levicki against Breann Moody.
Port Adelaide's depth is being tested early.
Levicki, 29, answered captain Erin Phillips' call to join her in crossing the bridge to Australian football from basketball where she earned the right to represent Australia six times while playing almost 200 games in the WNBL.
OPPO WATCH
SYDNEY coach Scott Gowans says his new team "just needs time ... " - a luxury in professional sport, but also a reality in a new league with its growing pains.
Gowans speaks of seven key performance indicators that will become the foundation of the "Swans way" in AFLW.
"I'd like people to understand - and I am not saying it as a cliche - the process is a process," Gowans says. "Our review has seven statistics we hang our hat on. We ask, 'Did we win them?', 'How did we win them?' and 'How is that going to make us ultimately a great side?'"
Sydney's trademark in Australian football is built on contested football. In the critical midfield battles, Sydney has strong form lines. Ally Morphett's work in ruck and Cynthia Hamilton and Lauren Szigeti showing eager capacity to win clearances. Hamilton is unavailable under concussion protocols.
TRIBUTE
CAPTAIN Erin Phillips plays her 50th AFLW game.
The resume as an AFLW pioneer - after conquering the world in basketball - reads for a Hall of Fame plaque: Three premierships, twice the league's best player. And the poster image for a new league.
Daughter of a club legend - premiership captain and Hall of Fame defender Greg Phillips - the Olympian was Port Adelaide's first signing for a senior women's team in 2015 when the AFLW was still on the planning whiteboard at AFL House in Melbourne. Phillips' influence on the successful launch of the AFLW in 2017 can never be under-estimated or understated.
"We do know it is our captain's 50th game," says Port Adelaide senior coach Lauren Arnell.
"Erin is a fantastic person, a fantastic leader. We spoke a little bit (on Thursday night) to the group about how much more there is for Erin at Port Adelaide. The current legacy she is building is unmatched."
“It's an incredibly special round and obviously I’m very, very honoured and privileged to play 50 games, but I’m more honoured to play in this particular round, in Indigenous round, and to wear the guernsey, which means so much to our club and our team and the broader community."
Port Adelaide captain Erin Phillips
ANOTHER FIRST
Kari Karra (emu in the sky).
Port Adelaide's first AFLW Indigenous guernsey is worn this weekend at Alberton Oval on ground where emus used to roam. Performing artists, sisters Jakirah and Tikana Telfer, designed the jumper with the cultural theme of the emu capturing the spirit of Port Adelaide's "Inaugurals".
The Telfers note: "The emu is precocial - once hatched from the egg, the emu will almost immediately walk, feed and fend for itself. It is independent and creates its own path for itself, in the same way the Port Adelaide women have."
“The guernseys are probably going to make us jump a little higher and run a little faster.”
Port Adelaide captain Erin Phillips
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"It’s probably down to our belief. We've had so much belief that we do have the ball movement and the skill to execute a good four-quarter game."
Port Adelaide defender Indy Tahau
BIRD SEED
(little stuff that means most)
PORT ADELAIDE V SYDNEY
When: Saturday, September 17, 2022
Time: 12.40pm
Where: Alberton Oval
First meeting of the teams
On the ladder - Port Adelaide 0-1-2, ranked 15th. Sydney, 0-3, ranked 17th.
Sydney is - with Port Adelaide, Hawthorn and Essendon - one of the last entries to the AFLW to give the national women's league the mirror image to the AFL men's series with 18 teams.
Sydney, as South Melbourne, will take credit for giving women the chance to play Australian football soon after World War II. In June 1947, two years after the end of hostilities in Europe and the Pacific, the South Melbourne Football Club placed a newspaper advertisement calling for women to play a game at the Swans' Lake Oval home in Melbourne. The game had the grander purpose of raising funds for the Red Cross to help war-torn Britain deal with food shortages - and more than 20,000 pushed the turnstiles at the Lake Oval to see South Melbourne beat St Kilda by 39 points.
Hence, the Sydney AFLW team starting its national league campaign against St Kilda three weeks ago.
Footscray and Carlton also had women's teams at Lake Oval where the "finale" between Footscray and South Melbourne ended in a draw, 2.4 each.
Last weekend: Port Adelaide scored its first AFLW premiership points with a 27-27 draw against Carlton at Princes Park in Melbourne. Sydney took a heavy hit in the first "Battle of the Bridge" AFLW style with an 18-65 loss to Greater Western Sydney.
Form lines - Port Adelaide, LLD (losing to West Coast by 12 points, losing to the Western Bulldogs by 19 points and the draw with Carlton); Sydney, LLL (losing to St Kilda by 29 points, losing to Collingwood by 31 points and the derby loss to Greater Western Sydney).
