Port Adelaide dentist Andrew Nakone quietly confident for a Power win

If there’s one man who knows the truth behind the most well-used sledge in Adelaide footy, it’s this Port Adelaide dentist.

Mad keen Port Adelaide fan Dentist Dr Andrew Nakone, who is a dentist at his clinic at Port Adelaide. Picture: Ben Clark

Dr Andrew Nakone is quietly confident he will be smiling broadly after a Port Adelaide finals win on Friday night, proudly showing a good set of teeth.

The dentist and dedicated Power fan works in the heart of Port Adelaide at the Commercial Rd Dental practice and says the club is an important part of the community, including team members happy to engage with the supporter base.

He concedes after the demoralising loss to Geelong it will be “a tall order” to regroup but says tough challenges can fuel success.

“Sometimes when the chips are down, if the team is good enough and hungry enough they will get there,” he said.

Dr Nakone is quietly confident about Port’s chances. Picture: Ben Clark

“You have young players who are hungry, they just have to do what they had been doing all year.

“For me, they are winners to have come so far.”

Dr Nakone brushed off Crows’ Josh Rachele’s provocative “toothless” gibe about Port supporters as being decades out of date.

Rachele caused outrage by sledging the Port Adelaide faithful on radio FIVEAA with a pre-Showdown quip that “Port supporters don’t have many teeth.”

He rubbed it in by rushing to the boundary pointing at his own teeth after slotting a goal in the Showdown, but had the episode blow up in his face when Port went on to win and he was later dropped for the final game of the season.

Dr Nakone noted the whole Port Adelaide area has seen major changes including new, well paid jobs, expensive real estate, an influx of professionals, skilled workers and retirees who have been leaders in their fields.

“I see a lot of small business people with plenty of staff, there also now is much more awareness of general health — and oral health is part of general health — so the stigma of 40 years ago of the one tooth drunk just does not exist,” he said.

Dr Nakone noted dental technology — such as implants — had vastly improved in the past couple of decades, as had knowledge of the importance of exercise and good diet including the dental risks of sugar, further improving oral health as well as full-toothed smiles in the area.

He observed the changes were community wide, recalling that once upon a time “people could smoke at their desks.”

“Oral hygiene has definitely improved,” he said. “I have been here since 1988 and there have been big changes over the years. It is just not what it was 30 or 40 years ago.”

It all points to some glistening “winners are grinners” smiles around the Port this weekend — provided the Power is switched on when they take on the Hawks.