1884 ... Organised football in Adelaide was in its eighth season ... and just three of the SA Football Association's original eight clubs from 1877 were still playing (Port Adelaide, South Adelaide and South Park).

Alberton Oval had replaced Buck's Flat at Glanville as the Port Adelaide Football Club's home ground since 1880.

And South Australians were still three years from having an express train service (the Intercolonial Express) between Adelaide and Melbourne ...

History has a habit of repeating.

Port Adelaide worked through a rollercoaster ride - and that "choker" syndrome - for the first eight years of its AFL story before claiming a hard-earned breakthrough national league premiership in 2004. The constant roadblock, finally overcome at the MCG on September 25, 2004, was Brisbane, winners of the previous three AFL titles.

This remarkably reads as a near replica to the storyline to Port Adelaide's first premiership.

Eight years, from the SAFA's first premiership in 1877 to Port Adelaide's first triumph in 1884.

A tough tale of near misses - second in 1878, 1879 and 1883, always to the quickly emerging rival at Norwood that after entering the SAFA in 1878 had collected six consecutive titles.

Port Adelaide had to shake off the "bridesmaid" label that had been pinned to the club and its players ... just as it did with the "chokers" tag that followed 130 years later. Persistence does pay off ...

Australian football's foundation years were based on a championship system - the best-performed team at the end of the pre-determined home-and-away fixture was crowned premiers. No finals. No grand final. The best team from early May to late September was king of SA football.

The decisive date for the 1884 SAFA premiership - and the long-running battle between Port Adelaide and Norwood - was at Adelaide Oval on Saturday, August 30.

Port Adelaide had a 7-2-1 win-draw-loss record.

Norwood was 7-1-2.

The winner of this match - even though there was still a full month of football to be played - was most likely to win the premiership ... and did.

Port Adelaide had lost to Norwood, 2-3 (goals being the only score that counted), at Alberton Oval in Round 3 on May 17.

Port Adelaide responded with an 8-3 win at Alberton in Round 11 on August 2. But the club went to Adelaide Oval three weeks later - after both teams had a 21-day break - never having beaten Norwood twice in a season nor in consecutive games.

History would have to be rewritten to make history.

The South Australian Register recorded the match was "the conquering game between the (two) clubs and virtually decided the premiership for the season 1884."

"Considerable interest was manifested in it, and in spite of the very dusty weather the attendance reached nearly 5,000. The supporters of both teams had mustered in strong force, and the excitement during the afternoon ran high, though a heavy gale blowing in the first half materially interfered with the exhibition of football.

"At times a good deal of unnecessary roughness was indulged in by members of each side ..."

It was the talking point of the season as "Goalpost" wrote in his season review in The Adelaide Observer: "A deal of jealousy and spite existed among players, more especially those in the Norwood and Port clubs." A meaningful rivalry was coming to be ...

In the second half of the 1884 premiership "play-off" Port Adelaide was counting the cost of the uncompromising tone in this battle. Port Adelaide first lost William Buchan with a dislocated shoulder and then Harry "Tick" Smith, after a heavy collision with Norwood novice George Duncan - and played for some time "two short".

This game did have a "look" that - again to prove history does repeat - proves "congestion" or "flooding" is not a modern concept in Australian football.

As The Register recorded: "It was evident that it would be impossible to make any headway against the strong gale blowing, and (Norwood captain Alfred 'Topsy") Waldron called all his forces back, (Port Adelaide captain Dick) Turpenny bringing his forward.

"The field now presented rather a peculiar aspect, only two men from each side being in the northern part of it, while about thirty players were all struggling on the ball in the south-eastern, corner, where the wind kept the play."

Port Adelaide won 3-0 (3.15 to 0.11 to be precise) to advance its record to 8-2-1 while Norwood was 7-1-3.

Port Adelaide finished the season by beating South Adelaide 2-1 at Alberton Oval; thrashing South Park 12-0 at Adelaide Oval to be beyond Norwood's reach; losing to South Adelaide 1-4 at Adelaide Oval when the race to the flag had been won and collecting a forfeit in the last round from South Park (that never again played).

Norwood lost 2-4 to North Adelaide (that also was in its last weeks of football), collected a forfeit from South Park and finished the season by avenging the loss to North Adelaide with a 7-1 triumph.

Port Adelaide had its first premiership with an 11-2-2 win-draw-loss record. The "bridesmaid" image was gone.

"For some years past the 'magentas' have been straining every nerve to gain this supremacy," wrote "Goalpost", "and at last their efforts have been crowned with success.

"They have some brilliant players included in their twenty, and though the supporters of the 'red-and blues' still cling to the idea that they are equal to vanquishing them, I am fully satisfied in my own mind that the Ports this season are the best team in the Association and that they have won their laurels honestly and fairly."

Those brilliant players included, in the eyes of "Goalpost", the best in SA football - George Cairns. "(He) is the best we have in the colony," "Goalpost" wrote. "He is a splendid man back, being very reliable, and is of equal service forward, where his marking and kicking have gained for him his fame.

"Perhaps the best all-round man is (Charles) Kellett, also of the Port club. He is a sure back, and always follows splendidly, and one of few who plays the game as it should be. During the season I have watched him very closely, and numbers have much to learn from the cool gentlemanly demeanour he always exhibits on the field."

Port Adelaide had its flag and its first premiership heroes ... Cairns, Kellett, the Victorian recruit Turpenny, follower Michael Coffee, wingman William Buchan, forward Robert Roy (the competition's leading goalkicker with 22) and novice Albert Mitchell.

The club's careful recruiting from Victoria and development of young local talent had finally, after eight years, created a winning blueprint. History would repeat more than 100 years later for a bigger competition, the AFL.

Season 1884 was the breakthrough year ... and the flags kept flying high at Alberton ... 1890, 1897, 1903, 1906, 1910, 1913, the "Invincibles" of 1914, 1921, 1928, 1936, 1937, 1939, 1951, the "Golden Era" with the six-in-a-row from  1954-1959, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1977, 1979, 1980, 1981, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1998, and 1999 in the SANFL, the 2004 AFL premiership and the four Champions of Australia titles won in 1890, 1910, 1913 and 1914.

By 1965, Port Adelaide had more SANFL premierships (23) than any of its rivals - and many of its opponents combined.

Hence why Port Adelaide's ethos is: "We exist to win premierships ..."

The parade of premiership heroes is heralded in the Port Adelaide Football Club Archives Collection.

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