PORT ADELAIDE was back on the winners’ list and still on top of the AFL ladder after beating Greater Western Sydney on Sunday afternoon.

It was a long day, starting with 4:30am alarms going off, a flight to the Gold Coast, the game, and then returning home to Adelaide around 9:30pm, but coming home with the points made it worth it.

Here are some key things we learned from the game.

1) Metricon or Portricon?

Port Adelaide’s love affair with Metricon Stadium at Carrara continues. The 17-point win over the Giants was the club’s fourth win from four games at the venue in 2020, having beaten Gold Coast, Fremantle, West Coast and now GWS there.

That makes it nine wins in nine games at the venue since it first played there against the Suns in May 2012. On that occasion it was a 48-point win. Sunday’s was the second lowest winning margin for Port Adelaide. Its lowest was a nine-point win over the Suns in Round 21, 2014.

The record at the venue has some fans asking if the stadium should be renamed:

2) GWS hoodoo ended.

Heading into the game Port not beaten Greater Western Sydney in its previous five outings. That included a heartbreaking one-point loss in round 19 last year. The Giants had Port’s measure since 2016 when they won both encounters between the sides (by 86 and 19 points).

Before the five straight losses, Port had enjoyed four straight wins, starting with a 56-point win at Football Park in 2013 and culminating 21-point win at Adelaide Oval in August 2015. Four straight wins followed by five straight wins. And despite some big blowouts, such is the closeness of the rivalry that just eleven points separates their aggregate scores after those matches. After eleven games, GWS has the advantage with six wins but Port has scored more points overall – 957 to GWS’s 946.

3) Port Adelaide players really like Ken Hinkley.

For all the club’s efforts to build connection between the playing, coaching and administration group, there was no better example than the moment after the game when coach Ken Hinkley was thrust into the centre of the playing group singing the team song in the rooms.

Celebrating his qualification for AFL Life Membership with 300 VFL/AFL games as a player and coach, Hinkley reluctantly became the centre of attention and the target of some well-aimed Powerade throwing by the players. It was a touching moment of togetherness in a year which has already seen so much isolation.

4) Contested response

Last week Hinkley said his side had been beaten up in the contest in the loss to Brisbane, and he would have been happy with the response on Sunday. Led by 99-game ruckman Scott Lycett (21 hit-outs), Port won the hit-outs 33-20. It then won the clearances 41-25, including 12-4 from the all-important centre clearances where Port struggled so much against the Lions.

Port players had more contested possessions (131-129) and had it not been for its 74 turnovers to 58, the 17-point margin could have been much higher.

5) Port’s midfield runs deep

Travis Boak kept to 16 disposals and Port still wins – it’s been a while since you could say that. But while the former skipper was kept quiet by his lofty standards, and Tom Rockliff was omitted after a few quiet weeks, it was up to others to stand up. Especially with the Giants finishing with the top five disposal winners in the game.

After just one disposal in the first quarter, Ollie Wines set the tone with a burst of five possessions inside three minutes in the second term before finishing with 20 and six clearances. But it was the lesser lights in the engine room who stood up. Dan Houston was superb in his return to the coalface. He had 16 disposals – 10 of them contested – by half time and finished with 22, Kane Farrell put in a classy performance and one the best in his short career, finishing with 19 touches, three marks, six tackles, two clearances and a long important goal, and Sam Powell-Pepper was perhaps the pick of them all, finishing with 22 disposals, three clearances and a goal amongst a power of running.