PHIL Walsh's tenure at Port Adelaide is known.
He joined the Power in 1999 as an assistant coach to Mark Williams, having worked as a fitness coach at Geelong prior to that.
But in a career that saw him travel to Port Adelaide from the Cattery, and before that the Brisbane Bears, Richmond and Collingwood, before moving on to West Coast and the Adelaide Crows in later years, Walsh was sure to establish relationships with many Port people along the way.
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Few realise that his first Port connections were formed at Victoria Park when he made his VFL debut in the black and white of Collingwood.
His coach in 1983 was Port Adelaide's most successful - John Cahill - who had joined the Victorian Magpies in 1982.
John would of course be Port Adelaide’s first AFL coach in 1997 and 1998. Walsh joined Port for the first time in 1999.
At Collingwood that year, Walsh played alongside Mark Williams, Greg Phillips and Wes Fellowes.
He then went to Richmond and after that, the Brisbane Bears.
It was with the Bears that he would become that club's first best-and-fairest, and where he played with Choco again, as well as Stephen Williams, Ben Harris, Martin Leslie and the Power's current director of coaching Shaun Hart.
His first gig as fitness coach at Geelong between 1995 and 1998 started relationships with figures in footy that he would rekindle later in life.
There he worked for the first time with current Port AFL coach Ken Hinkley, SANFL coach Garry Hocking and the club’s first AFL goal kicker Shayne Breuer when the trio were players at Kardinia Park.
So too Brenton Sanderson who would join Port’s assistant coaching panel in 2006 and precede Walsh in the senior coaching role at the Crows.
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The rest is history.
He joined Port Adelaide as a coach in 1998, and worked alongside many coaches, players and club footy and admin staff for 10 seasons until 2008, many were rekindled again when he returned in 2014.
Coaches and fitness managers who worked alongside Walsh at Port Adelaide included Geoff Morris, Matt Rendell, David Hutton, Dean Bailey, David Pitman, Alastair Clarkson, Mark Mickan, Tony McGuinness, Brenton Sanderson, Jason Cripps, Adam Kingsley, Matthew Primus, Darren Travena, Josh Carr, Tyson Edwards, Shaun Hart, Matthew Nicks, Garry Hocking, Stuart Cochrane, Aaron Greaves, Dave Arnfield, Matthew Hornsby, Andrew Russell, Darren Burgess, and Dan Comerford.
Here’s a list of all the players he worked with at Port Adelaide. As you can see, it's a long list of players who he was involved making better footballers, and men, at Alberton.
Cain Ackland, Brendon Ah Chee, Karl Amon, Jordan Barham, Scott Bassett, Nathan Batsanis, Greg Bentley, Matthew Bishop, Scott Borlace, Travis Boak, Matthew Bode, Shane Bond, Daniel Boyle, Shayne Breuer, Matthew Broadbent, Dean Brogan, Barry Brooks, Steven Brosnan, Peter Burgoyne, Shaun Burgoyne, Darren Burton, John Butcher, Alipate Carlile, Josh Carr, Tom Carr, Dom Cassisi, Brett Chalmers, Troy Chaplin, Wade Champion, Wade Chapman, Tom Clurey, Stuart Cochrane, Che Cockatoo-Collins, Adam Cockshell, Sam Colquhoun, Chad Cornes, Kane Cornes, Jaxon Crabb, Stephen Daniels, Fabian Deluca, Stuart Dew, Donald Dickie, Nathan Eagleton, Brad Ebert, Brett Ebert, Ben Eckermann, Dale Ellis, Paul Evans, James Ezard, Mitch Farmer, Nigel Fiegert, Daniel Flynn, Robert Forster-Knight, Fabian Francis, Josh Francou, Barnaby French, Jonathan Giles, Stephen Gilham, Robbie Gray, Sam Gray, Adam Grocke, Gavin Grose, Brent Guerra, Scott Hahn, Chris Hall, Damien Hardwick, Peter Hardy, Mitch Harvey, Hamish Hartlett, Mark Harwood, Salim Hassan, Campbell Heath, Cam Hitchcock, Ben Hollands, Jack Hombsch, Jarman Impey, Paul Koulouriotis, Nathan Krakouer, Nick Jackman, Roger James, Tom Jonas, Adam Kingsley, Brendon Lade, Alex Lee, Matthew Lobbe, Bowen Lockwood, Tom Logan, Nathan Lonie, Tim Looby, Nick Lower, Brayden Lyle, Josh Mahoney, Tim Masierowski, Mark McKenzie, Darren Mead, Hugh Minson, Kane Mitchell, Andrew Moore, Angus Monfries, Brett Montgomery, Adam Morgan, Danny Morton, Daniel Motlop, Marlon Motlop, Allan Murray, Derek Murray, Chris Naish, Jake Neade, Ben Newton, Cameron O’Shea, Joel Patfull, Stephen Paxman, Danyle Pearce, Luke Peel, Michael Pettigrew, Byron Pickett, Jasper Pittard, Jared Polec, Darryl Poole, Jared Poulton, Matthew Primus, Jarrad Redden, Brent Renouf, Thomas Rischbieth, David Rodan, Sam Russell, Steven Salopek, Nick Salter, Jarrad Schofield, Jay Schulz, Aaron Shattock, Mason Shaw, Nathan Steinberner, Michael Stevens, Nick Stevens, Lewis Stevenson, Paul Stewart, Jacob Surjan, Brad Symes, Matt Thomas, Adam Thomson, Toby Thurstans, Warren Tredrea, Jackson Trengove, Darryl Wakelin, Peter Walsh, Gavin Wanganeen, Elijah Ware, Don Webb, Justin Westhoff, Matthew Westhoff, Damon White, Matt White, Ryan Williams, Ryan Willits, Michael Wilson, Ollie Wines, Chad Wingard, Aaron Young.
