PORT ADELAIDE held its spot in the AFL’s top four with a relatively comfortable 34-point win over Hawthorn on Saturday night.

The Hawks booted the first goal of the game but Port effectively ended the contest with the next nine majors – spoiling the 400^th game milestone celebrations for Shaun Burgoyne.

Here are some key things we learned from the game.

1) Wines wins

After his latest 43-disposal effort against Hawthorn, the powerful Port Adelaide midfielder is averaging 32.5 disposals from 15 games, a career-best figure. The 26-year-old Wines was clearly the best player on the field on Saturday night, adding 13 clearances (a best-ever figure for the 173-gamer), 23 contested possessions and eight inside-50s. The AFL world knows how damaging Wines can be at his best, but consistency has been an issue in seasons past. 2021 is heralding a different Wines, and he'll be a crucial cog as Port Adelaide looks to a deep finals run. - Sarah Black/AFL Media

2) Versatility pays

Ken Hinkley and his coaching staff made a point this year of ensuring each player had multiple strings to his bow. Versatility was the name of the game, making sure players could play more than one position in case need arose. Saturday night’s win over Hawthorn was a key example of that policy paying off. Sam Mayes – previously deployed as a defender and in the midfield, spent most of the game up forward, finishing with two goals. Dan Houston is another who has at various times this season occupied the centre square as well as he has marshalled the backline. With Kane Farrell’s knee injury and the absence of Zak Butters, Robbie Gray and Orazio Fantasia, there was a need for a small forward and Houston floated forward at times as well. Miles Bergman went from a wing to half forward and recorded two majors of his own and defender Martin Frederick came on as the medical substitute and also bagged a goal – a special moment as the six-gamer danced inside Shaun Burgoyne and calmly slotted his first career goal.

3) Boak most wins for Port

Travis Boak is slowly re-writing the record books at Port Adelaide and the 297-gamer grabbed another record when he notched his 152^nd win in Power colours on Saturday night. It made him the winningest Port Adelaide AFL player, overtaking Kane Cornes’ 151 wins. Boak also overtook Cornes for most disposals for the club in the AFL at the weekend, now sitting 25 in front (7085 to 7060), and will hopefully soon catch Cornes’s club AFL games record of 300 games as well. Cornes enjoyed 151 wins, 147 losses and two draws in his time while Boak has had 152 wins, 144 losses and a draw. Warren Tredrea had 145 wins in his 255 games while Justin Westhoff (138 wins, 280 games) and Chad Cornes (133 wins, 239 games) make up the rest of the top five for wins at the club.

4) Injury curse continues but some good news

Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley must be wondering whether he crossed paths with a black cat this year given the number of injuries to key players his side has had. Having lost Robbie Gray and Lachie Jones in recent weeks, Kane Farrell was the latest to be added to the injury list with a season-ending knee injury early in the first quarter on Saturday night. However, Hinkley would have been thrilled however to see a quartet of players return from injury in the SANFL earlier in the day, especially Zak Butters (knee/ankle), Tom Clurey (jaw) and Jackson Mead (spleen) who were back from long-term absences. Hamish Hartlett also returned after missing a week with a hip flexor issue. With Xavier Duursma expected to be back this week after knee surgery and Orazio Fantasia not too far behind, the reinforcements might just be back when they are most needed – in the run in to the finals.

5) Burgoyne universally loved – even at Port

His is a story that started 21 years ago when was drafted by Port Adelaide. 400 games, two clubs and four premierships make for an absolute icon of the game. The Indigenous games record holder, Burgoyne is a life member of the Port Adelaide Football Club. The ceremony before the game at Marvel, the noise from the crowd every time he got near the ball and the respect shown by both sides as he was chaired from the ground through a guard of honour by former teammate Travis Boak and current colleague Liam Shiels showed the universal admiration for one of the competition’s true greats. One of only five players to reach 400 game milestone, Burgoyne is the only player to play his 400^th career game against former side. He didn’t get the result he was after but he certainly got the admiration he deserved.