PORT ADELAIDE returned to the AFL’s top four with a gutsy 13-point win over St Kilda at Marvel Stadium on Saturday.

An undermanned Port side withstood some early pressure and a third-quarter charge by the Saints to record an important win.

Here are some key things we learned from the game.

1) Anyone, anywhere, any time

Port Adelaide’s mantra in 2020 was that it would be prepared to face “anyone, anywhere at any time”. Such was the uncertainty around last year’s fixture that the club needed to be of such a mindset. 2021 has been different to this point. The AFL has been able to get away the majority of the campaign and we all probably felt like we might get through relatively unscathed. Round 18 was a test for nearly all sides. Port Adelaide became the first side to travel into a COVID-19 hotspot. Its fixture was changed from a Saturday night game to a Saturday afternoon game, less than 24 hours out – forcing a change in travel plans. The club flew into Melbourne early on Saturday morning, leaving players to kill a few hours in a room at Marvel Stadium before playing, killing another couple of hours and then dashing off to the airport to return home to Adelaide. It is a sign of a good side that is adaptable that Port Adelaide was not impacted, despite the limited notice of the changes and the potential interruption to the side’s preparation.

2) Georgiades rising

He set the crowd off at Adelaide Oval with his AFL Mark of the Year contender last week – winning the Round 17 nomination for the award – and backed it up with a starring performance against St Kilda. Mitch Georgiades’s four goals from ten disposals and five marks proved telling in a game in which it was hard to hit the scoreboard. A twice nominated AFL Rising Star nominee, Georgiades should be right up in the discussions for the eventual winner in 2021, yet isn’t often spoken about. Still just 19, he has now booted 27 goals for the season from his 16 games – the same number as West Coast forward Oscar Allen who has three years and 31 games of extra experience on him. Only Charlie Dixon (33 from 17 games) has more goals this year than Georgiades and coach Ken Hinkley has repeatedly said the duo, along with fellow forward Todd Marshall, will continue to improve the more they play together.

3) The future is bright at Alberton

Much has been made of the absence from the Port Adelaide line-up of three of its brightest stars – Connor Rozee, Xavier Duursma and Zak Butters but there has been plenty to like about some of the players who have taken their places in the team. On Saturday, Port’s line-up included eight players with fewer than 30 matches to their names, while Lachie Jones and Dylan Williams also made their AFL debuts against Richmond and Sydney respectively. Saturday’s line-up included Willem Drew (27 games), Peter Ladhams (25), Mitch Georgiades (23), Jarrod Lienert (23), Miles Bergman (16), Boyd Woodcock (10), Martin Frederick (eight) and Jed McEntee, who made his AFL debut as the medical substitute, coming on in the last quarter.

4) Small forward shortage covered

When the news broke that forwards Connor Rozee and Steven Motlop were the latest additions to Port Adelaide’s injury list, the tally of first-choice small forwards missing from the line-up read a depressing six. With Robbie Gray, Orazio Fantasia, Zak Butters, Kane Farrell, Rozee and Motlop missing, Port went taller – with the inclusion of ruck/forward Peter Ladhams – more versatile – with Sam Mayes, Sam Powell-Pepper, Karl Amon and Darcy Byrne-Jones at times – and younger – with Boyd Woodcock’s elevation from the SANFL – in the forward line, and on this occasion it worked. Mayes and Woodcock each had their chances, and each converted once. Woodcock’s goal would have pleased coach Ken Hinkley. The third-year player smothered the ball off the boot of former teammate Dougal Howard to keep it deep inside forward 50 and then responded quickest to claim the ball and snap it home.

5) Port likes playing the Saints

After Saturday’s game, Port now boasts a 22-wins from 33 games against St Kilda and that’s despite losing its first five games against the Saints between 1997-2001. In recent times the pendulum has swung wildly in Port’s favour with ten wins in their last eleven meetings. It probably helps that eight of those games were in Adelaide, either at Adelaide Oval or Football Park. The sides also met in Shanghai in 2019. Saturday’s game was the first time the sides had met in Melbourne and at Docklands since Round 17, 2013 - almost eight years to the day. The strangest thing is that what seems an unfair fixture (eight games at home from the last 11 meetings for Port) was actually flipped on its head at the start of Port’s AFL journey with the Saints enjoying eight games at home from the first eleven matches between the sides. (three at Waverley, three at Docklands and two at York Park in Tasmania).