WATCH one of John Butcher's 10 season goals above on PTV.

PORT Adelaide ruckman Brent Renouf has defended out-of-form forward John Butcher, saying he should retain his spot in the side despite his horror game against North Melbourne at the weekend.

While the Power managed to pull off a remarkable two-point victory against the Kangaroos, Butcher had a game to forget, managing just two kicks before he was subbed out of the game in the third quarter.

Drafted with pick No. 8 at the 2009 NAB AFL Draft, Butcher has kicked 21 goals in his first 10 games of AFL, but struggled against the Roos.

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Rather than attempting to find his form in the SANFL with Port Adelaide, Renouf said it would be better for Butcher to remain in the senior side and play through his rough patch against Gold Coast on Saturday.

"When he's running and jumping into packs and clunking marks we'll back him in to do that all day, so he'll have a good week on the track and he'll fight back this weekend," Renouf said.

"I don't think anything was wrong, it was just the way it happened."

Renouf said he was "stoked" to get his first win as a Port Adelaide player against the Kangaroos, after the Power came back from 32 points early in the final term to steal the win.

At three-quarter time, the game looked all but over, with North Melbourne dominating in several key areas.

But Renouf said the players never felt as though the game was out of reach and that at the final break coach Matthew Primus had implored the players to "take the game on".

"I think we had [the belief we could win] in us all day," Renouf said.

"We just kept at our structure all day and in the three-quarter time huddle, Matty said 'just take the game on' and that's what we did.

"It was great to get my first win for the club and hopefully it's the start of a few more."

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A premiership ruckman at Hawthorn, Renouf said the victory would give his side the confidence it needed to win consecutive games for the first time since rounds 20-22 in 2010.

"Our backs were against the wall and we came back and won the game I think that will go a long way to a lot of our guys just believing that we can do it," he said.

"We've shown in patches in the first few games that we can do that to sides, we can score heavily and score fast and it's just a matter of stringing that together and doing that each week."

Harry Thring covers Port Adelaide news for AFL.com.au. Follow him on Twitter: @AFL_Harry