It is still 129 days until Port Adelaide plays its first game of the 2019 AFL Premiership season and we just can’t wait.

To occupy our minds we have been analysing the Power’s fixture in greater depth, finding some odd quirks, interesting co-incidences and some other random information that will help provide some conversation over the dinner table.

 

MCG’s round 1 quirk

Port Adelaide will start the season at the MCG against Melbourne. The last time that happened was in Round 1 2013 when the Power won by 79 points in Ken Hinkley’s first game as coach of the club. The only other time the Power has started the season at the MCG resulted in another 79-point margin – a loss in the club’s first AFL game against Collingwood in 1997.

Saturday night lights

After just one Saturday night game in 2018, the Power will be back in the timeslot most preferred by its members in 2019. Port will have 10 games in either the Saturday night or Saturday twilight timeslot. Of the club’s six Saturday night games, four will be at Adelaide Oval, against Adelaide (Rd 8), Geelong (Rd 14), the Western Bulldogs (Rd 15) and Greater Western Sydney (Rd 19). It will host Saturday twilight games against Carlton (Rd 2) and Richmond (Rd 4) while the second Showdown against Adelaide and the Round 13 game against Fremantle in Perth will also be in that timeslot.

 

Sydney by-pass

The Power will play at seven different venues in 2019, compared with eight in 2018. After not travelling to Queensland at all in 2018, in 2019 it will not travel to New South Wales. It will host Sydney for the first time since April 2015, when it went down by 48 points at Adelaide Oval. In its four visits to the SCG since Port has won two by an average of 25.5 points and lost two by an average of 38.5.

The last time the Power played the Swans in Adelaide, Tim and John Farriss of INXS tossed the coin 

Adelaide Oval Sun(s)

The Gold Coast will play Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval in Round Round 9. It will be a unique experience for the Suns who have played Port more in Shanghai than at the best venue in the competition. The only time the Suns met the Power at Adelaide Oval was in Round 23 of 2017 when they suffered an embarrassing 115-point loss. In fact the Suns have not beaten Port since the first meeting between the sides in Round 5 of 2011.

 

Perth potential

For the second year in a row, Port Adelaide will play twice in Perth – against West Coast (in Round 5) and Fremantle (Round 13). It’ll be the second year in a row Port plays two games at the new Optus Stadium, a venue where it has yet to taste victory. The only other AFL venue it has played at where it is yet to win a game is Tasmania’s Bellerive Oval, where it lost its first and only game by 10 points to North Melbourne in 2013.

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