Dear Members and Supporters,
It’s not important…unless you make it important.
It’s a little life lesson, which rings louder today than it ever has.
As people all over the world tackle the dual impact of a health crisis and the resultant financial hardship incurred trying to stay safe, it has forced many of us to re-evaluate what is really important in our lives.
Not surprisingly… family, community and a sense of belonging have rarely felt so essential.
As the Prison Bar debate rose up again this week, it reaffirmed once more that unless you are part of the Port Adelaide family and really understand what this iconic guernsey means to this football Club and its people…It’s easy to dismiss its significance.
To hear media commentators bemoaning the fact that the issue was being discussed again, and the odd opportunistic supporters of other clubs trying to roll out the old argument that somehow the Port Adelaide Football Club playing in the AFL today, isn’t the same Club that was born in 1870 was as laughable as it was understandable. They just don’t get it.
Which is precisely why the fight must go on.
It’s not important unless we make it important.
The reality is that our history matters.
For 150 years, the Port Adelaide Football Club has been a beacon for the game of Australian Football.
It has toiled, often in the face of great hardship, to be the best football Club it could be.
It has produced champions and champion teams at a rate unparalleled in sport in this country, as we’ve seen just this week with two more Port Adelaide players recognised in the Australian Football Hall of Fame. Hearty congratulations to Greg Phillips and his family and to the family of the late, great John Abley. We felt your pride as we recounted those champions deeds in that iconic black-and-white guernsey.
Most importantly, the Port Adelaide Football Club, through heroes such as Abley and Phillips, has provided hope, identity, purpose and joy for its people…the legion of supporters who have been both inspired and energised by the deeds of their Club, but equally have been there to fight for it and lift it through periods of despair and risk.
Since 1902, the Prison Bar guernsey has been the embodiment of our Club’s values.
It is more than a uniform.
It’s one of our games great treasures, as Nathan Buckley, David Parkin, Kevin Sheedy, Dennis Cometti and many other informed and educated students of Australian Football have graciously acknowledged.
When we chose to elevate the Club onto the national stage in 1997, we understood that it would mean that we could not wear the Prison Bars on a week to week basis in the AFL, or carry the Magpie emblem on our AFL guernsey.
We’re not asking for that.
We are simply asking to wear the Prison Bar guernsey twice a year in Showdowns as a permanent nod to its significance to our Club, our community and more broadly the contribution it has made to the heritage of Australian football. This rivalry embodies everything great about football in this state, and to wear our traditional prison bar strip in these games just adds to that.
We believe it is an important matter, and we look forward to discussing the proposition further with the AFL in the coming weeks.
Can’t wait for the Showdown!!
KT
