CARETAKER coach Garry Hocking has thrown some challenging changes into his training mix ahead of Port Adelaide’s final match of the 2012 AFL season and says he wants to keep working with the club beyond the end of this year.

Unmoved on his decision to wait until the end of the year to determine his candidacy for the vacant senior coaching role at the Power, Hocking affirmed his desire to remain involved at Alberton in any role.

 ”Look I love the club,” said Hocking.

“It’s a great place to work and if the opportunity is there to continue in some role, whether that be moving back to the forwards or in a development role I’d still be excited about being involved in the club.

“You’re here to try and make clubs better, it’s not about you [as the coach].

“You want the players to go out and play a great style of footy you get rewarded by that, it’s the good feeling that you get.”

[ Related: Hocking's charge stepping up ]

All coaches have a different approach to the game and how to get the best out of their players.

For Hocking, motivating his charges has involved putting the playing group out of its comfort zone in what he calls a “rainbow” flavoured approach away from the “vanilla” of daily skills and weights sessions.

That approach has filtered through to his game day coaching and has reaped rewards with the likes of Chad Wingard revelling in the opportunity given by Hocking to play in the centre against Brisbane.

Wingard accrued 27 disposals and a subsequent NAB AFL Rising Star nomination.

[ Related: Wingard's Star Rising ]

On Tuesday Hocking organised a skills challenge where the playing group split off into two teams of ‘South Australia’ and the ‘Rest of the World’.

Challenges included timed kicking, handballing, reflex, accuracy, swimming and team-building drills.

Failure was punished with a chilly ice bath or a tennis ball pelting. 

“You’ve got to be able to change it up now and then … you’ve got to keep the players motivated, challenged,” said Hocking of his training challenge.

“We’ve put the players on notice and kept them on edge.

“We’ve done a few things over the previous few weeks, we’ve been in the water early in the morning atoning for some of our performances.

“If you look at the tackle count against Hawthorn - forty-two to sixty-one on the weekend - it certainly does work when you make the players accountable.

“We haven’t let our performances on the ground slip, we haven’t let the ‘non-negotiables’ slip through to the keeper.”

Hocking is looking to bag his first win as an AFL senior coach against Richmond at the MCG on Sunday, with gun defender Hamish Hartlett a certainty to return from suspension.

Port Adelaide’s 25-man squad will be announced first on PortAdelaideFC.com.au at 5.55pm (CST) on Thursday evening.