Port Adelaide runs out against Melbourne in Round 3, 2024 - almost ten years exactly since the re-developed Adelaide Oval was first in play. Image: AFL Photos.

NOT every party ends with champagne and cake. Still, as far as a 10th anniversary moment goes, Adelaide Oval was centre stage to quite a show on and off the field on Saturday night.

Almost 10 years to the day when the economically redeveloped Adelaide Oval was baptised as the newest theatre of AFL dreams on March 29, 2014, Port Adelaide and Melbourne at the weekend gave the ultimate game-day experience to the 38,000 at the Oval and the national television audience.

Just as we all learned on Sunday, September 4, 2011 - when Port Adelaide and Melbourne closed their home-and-away seasons with the first AFL match at the "old" Adelaide Oval - it is more than a stadium that lights up the town when football is played on the northern banks of the River Torrens.

A city comes alive ... it becomes an extension of Adelaide Oval with its restaurants, pubs, cafes, clubs and even a casino. Adelaide Oval and its city surrounds is much more than a big car park with barbecues at West Lakes. The $535 million of public money spent on redeveloping Adelaide Oval from 2012-2014 has been paid back many times across the past decade while the fans make a Saturday night game at the city ground more than a just a few hours at the footy.

The Port Adelaide Football Club's business model is now sustainable rather than dire, as it was from the stadium returns at Football Park, West Lakes. We may all grizzle at the annual price rises at the stadium food concessions, but there is the reassuring note the hard-earned money spent is underpinning a local football model rather than chasing double-digit returns for a corporation with international investors.

Robbie Gray lines up for goal in Round 2, 2014. Image: AFL Photos.

For all the economic concepts developed across the past decade at Adelaide Oval, there is no escaping it is the fans and not any architect - as good as David Johnson and his team were with their pavilion themes for the Oval - who make the venue stand out for more than a football game.

Indeed, the COVID pandemic - with its lockdowns and then world-first restricted crowds - did give a new meaning to "empty" while putting on a party with no-one showing up. The atmosphere outside Adelaide Oval can be as uplifting as that within once the game begins. 

Port Adelaide fans certainly have put their mark on what Brownlow Medallist Gerard Healy quickly dubbed "The Portress". That giant pear outside the southern entrance does remind all how good it is to laugh at oneself.

The 10th anniversary of the "new" Adelaide Oval does set off an alarm with the guardians of the venue. In an era when international sporting stadia are knocked down and rebuilt every 20 years, how does Adelaide Oval avoid the dreaded tag of having its infrastructure labelled as "tired and worn out"?

On Saturday night, anniversary night, the Port Adelaide fans again brought an energy to the game that overwhelms any latest technological advance in LED lighting and screens. That the Never Tear Us Apart anthem needs less and less of the original INXS soundtrack as a backdrop tells how much the Port Adelaide supporters have taken charge. 

But how does Adelaide Oval become better for its 20th anniversary in 2034?

Perhaps the tradition of the team names plates on the old scoreboard be presented in club colours rather than black and white. A small detail, but ...

On field, Port Adelaide has now played 125 AFL games at Adelaide Oval since that first victory against Melbourne in 2011. There is a 78-47 win-loss count. The turnstiles have clicked over for 4.5 million fans at an average (distorted by the COVID lock-outs) of 36,000.

Port Adelaide has produced an average score of 90 points (13.12) at Adelaide Oval, 16 points more than its 17 AFL rivals have managed in those 125 matches so far.