PORT ADELAIDE General Manager – Football, Chris Davies has described the club’s efforts during the trade period as a success after securing its two trade targets without giving up too much.

Port Adelaide brought in defender Aliir Aliir from Sydney and forward Orazio Fantasia from Essendon without losing any players.

The club also managed to retain enough draft picks to ensure it has enough points at next month’s draft to match any bid for highly rated NGA prospect Lachie Jones and father-son option Taj Schofield.

“We went into the trade period wanting those two players and not necessarily wanting any of our players to go so from that perspective it’s gone really well,” Davies said during a press conference on Friday.

“A future second round for Aliir – a guy who we think can come in and certainly put pressure on our current guys and add real depth to an area of the ground that we’re already pretty good in – but also to get Orazio – a player who not only can play a spot on the ground that we think can help us but also help other areas of the ground see some players move into other spots – is going to provide real value for us.”

There was some doubt about whether the Fantasia deal would be finalised with Essendon initially requesting a trade for a player including young stars Zak Butters, Xavier Duursma or Mitch Georgiades.

The trade eventually went through with a pick swap – picks 29 and a future third round selection went to the Bombers while pick 73 came back the other way – just minutes before the trade deadline.

But Davies was always confident the trade would be completed.

“I like to think that we’re the type of club that when we say we’re going to do something, we do it,” he said.

“Once (Fantasia) committed to us, we committed to getting the deal done.

“There are limits to that. Clearly we weren’t going to trade some of the players who were mentioned and we were obviously not going to trade our first round pick next year but we worked hard to put some other things in place that ultimately got things done.”

Davies joked with list manager Jason Cripps about the reaction from supporters and coaches if he had allowed some of the players Essendon wanted to leave Port Adelaide.

But he said the thought of letting any of those players leave was never entertained.

“I was worried for my own personal safety if we decided to tip out some of the players that Essendon had asked for first off,” he laughed.

“If we had let Zak Butters go, I reckon people would have been picketing the front of Alberton Oval looking for me.

“Jason and I had a good laugh about what would be the case about whether we decided to trade one of those guys – whether it be from our supporter base or some of our coaches.

“They wouldn’t have been all that happy.”

And Davies said it felt like Port Adelaide had become a place where players wanted to play.

He said much of that had come down to the culture and history of the club.

“We haven’t gone after too many players that haven’t ended up coming to us over my time over the last four or five years and before that it was Ryder and a couple of others,” Davies explained.

“I think we’ve made a mark on the competition enough that players want to come here and that’s a reflection on not only Jason Cripps and our list management team who have shown an ability to get deals done but also the coaches and the environment that the club’s got.

“We’ve got the added benefit of 150 years of history that people are attracted to.

“There’s no doubt that when we bring people through our facilities that they get enveloped pretty quickly into what is a pretty historic club.

“You see when their families come to our family day, to be able to show them that this club has significant history, a successful history and that we’re going to look after their boys, is something that I am proud of but equally and more importantly that we start to put those performances on the board that show it’s not just enough to be a destination club – we need to start winning.

“It’s now time for us on-field to continue to progress. We made a preliminary final this year and we want to be better than that.”

Davies finished his press conference by hinting that supporters could expected some announcements around contract extensions for some exciting young players in the coming weeks.