AFL 2022: Follow all the Port Adelaide news counting down to round 1
Port Adelaide has provided an update on Jeremy Finlayson’s fitness as the forward tries to recover from a back issue in time to make his club debut this weekend.
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Port Adelaide expects to field its chosen 22 against Brisbane on Saturday after Jeremy Finlayson’s recovery from a back issue.
Former GWS forward Finlayson went down during Thursday’s training session at Alberton but was named that evening and club doctors had cleared him to play.
The 26-year-old is on track to make his club debut, having featured 66 times for the Giants.
Port Adelaide will take the unusual step of having four travelling emergencies as a precaution due to Covid case numbers increasing in the community.
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Power coach Ken Hinkley said Finlayson and the team were raring to go as it stood, “but you just never know” if things could change.
“Everything’s on track and going OK,” Hinkley said.
“Jeremy had a little incident at training with his back, he’s pulled up fine this morning and everything’s OK.
“Doctors rang me this morning and said ‘look, he’s fine, there’s no problems at all, he’s ready to go’.
“There’s some chance he gets on a flight and he doesn’t quite travel as well as he’d like and something happens again.”
Jackson Mead will on Saturday night become the first father-son draftee of a former Power player to debut.
The son of inaugural Power best-and-fairest Darren Mead, Mead was taken with pick 25 in the 2019 national draft and missed a large part of last season with a ruptured spleen.
The 20-year-old had impressed Hinkley over summer with his competitive nature and neat skills on both sides of his body.
“(A ruptured spleen is) a big injury and in some ways it’s a life-threatening injury, but he was able to recover really strongly,” Hinkley said.
“I’m really pleased (about the debut) for him and his family.”
The Power has lost its past three matches against the Lions at the Gabba, last winning there in 2017.
With both sides again tipped to be among the premiership favourites, Port Adelaide has an opportunity to make an early statement with a victory as it seeks to atone this year for last season’s preliminary final exit.
Hinkley was confident its attack could perform well without sidelined duo Charlie Dixon and Orazio Fantasia, who were recovering from respective ankle and knee surgeries.
“Every game is an opportunity for you to consolidate who you are and what you are and what you want to be,” Hinkley said.
“They’ve been able to dominate us around the footy a little bit.”
Hinkley said Dixon would probably play at some level next week and the club’s top draftee, Josh Sinn, was close to making the side.
Although Hinkley expected his team to always start the season well, he warned it was dangerous to draw too many conclusions from Round 1.
“You’ve got to let a few rounds play out before you get too carried away with what’s going on,” he said.
“But reality is everyone wants to see their best pre-season training transfer and we’re no different.”
WINES DECLARES HE’S READY FOR BROWNLOW HEAT
Simeon Thomas-Wilson
Ollie Wines concedes if you asked him a month ago how he felt about coming into this season with the title of reigning Brownlow medallist he was “a little bit rattled with it”.
But after some “good conversations” with Power senior coach Ken Hinkley, and others around the club, Wines says he is in the right place to avoid the drop-off others have after claiming the prized individual award.
The 27-year-old inside bull created history for Port Adelaide last year when he became the club’s first Brownlow medallist.
Ahead of the Power’s first game of the 2022 season, a testing away match against Brisbane, Wines conceded the honour was weighing on him during the pre-season.
“If you probably asked me a month ago I would have been a little bit rattled with it and the expectations but I’ve had some good conversations with some people and I’ve been able to put that at the back of my mind and reset and despite wearing that tag it doesn’t define who I am now and the player I am now,” he said.
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“So restarting and being as hungry as ever is how I’m approaching that and you will see that on Saturday night.”
But he said he was now in a good place on the eve of Port’s campaign after talking to people around the club.
“A lot with Kenny (Hinkley), Kenny has been my right hand man since I came to the club. I’ve opened up to him not just about footy but personal life so he has an enormous experience around that,” he said.
“He has a lot of lessons there, as well as our club pysc Amanda (Le Couteur) who has been enormous and has done a lot of work with me not just on this but some anxiety stuff so there are a lot of people around the club I can talk to.”
In recent years the Brownlow medallist has been unable to reach the lofty heights the following season.
Wines said he was confident he could avoid this.
“To win a Brownlow you have to have a pretty big year so I understand that, but I’m certainly not falling in that trap,” he said.
“I feel like I have a lot to improve on and I have worked on that over the off-season.
“My role, personally I know it down to a tee it is pretty simple in my mind.
“So nothing revolves around numbers for me, it is all around my role for the team and if I’m able to do that I’m happy with that so I will be doing everything I can to continue on my form.
“I think you can probably look on what you have done in the past and want to maintain that.
“But I think you have to look for improvement to keep you honest … there has been little things in my game, like getting off handballs and driving through tackles when I get the ball
Just little things that I continue to work on.”
Wines has completed his 10th pre-season at Alberton, saying it “has been as good as my best ones”.
The addition of midfield depth at the Power also has him optimistic.
“I made the comment to Kenny a couple of weeks ago, I wasn’t so much worried but I was sort of thinking 12 to 18 months ago where are the next mids coming through when Boaky and Robbie move on,” he said.
“But I think the growth in guys like Willem Drew and Meady (Jackson Mead), Zak (Butters) and Connor (Rozee) coming into the midfield, Karl (Amon) and Xavier Duursma these guys who have been on the outside and coming inside I think we have ample options there and we are almost going down that team full of mids.”
Butters in particular has impressed in pre-season and Wines said despite his slight frame, the 21-year-old was more than ready to throw his body around.
“About a month ago he dropped big Sammy Hayes the ruckman at a contest, for some reason he has the hardest body you can find,” Wines said.
Is Hinkley finger pointing fair? Legends weigh in
Footy legends Nathan Buckley, Jason Dunstall and Nick Riewoldt believe criticism from a section of Port Adelaide fans towards Ken Hinkley is unjustified and that he is the right man for the job at Alberton.
Port Adelaide has made two preliminary finals appearances in the past two years, and has won the most games in the AFL during that period.
But after the thrashing at the hands of the Western Bulldogs in the 2021 prelim, irate Power fans took to social media, forums and the airwaves to criticise Hinkley.
At the Fox Footy launch in Melbourne last week the three footy legends praised Hinkley’s work at the Power and backed him as the right person for the role.
Dunstall said he had “no doubt” that the Power could bridge the gap to Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs under Hinkley.
“I find it quite interesting actually, because I think he has got them in a great position, they have a strong list, they have recruited well, they play an exciting brand of football,” he said.
“I enjoy watching Port Adelaide play, they are an exciting team to watch, so if I was a fan of Port Adelaide I would be reasonably happy with where they are at.
“I’m not sure why you would be pointing the finger at Ken Hinkley, I think he’s done a great job.”
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Riewoldt said there would be some scars from the loss at the hands of the Bulldogs, but this was on the players, not on Hinkley.
“That was really as meek an effort as we’ve seen from Port Adelaide in a big game for a long time, so I’m really interested to see how they respond to that and whether they do have any scars from that or mental demons,” he said.
“Ken is a great coach, I thought the players let themselves down rather than Port Adelaide being out-coached.”
Under Hinkley, the Power have made three preliminary finals.
Hinkley is contracted until the end of 2023, and 2022 is his 10th season as senior coach.
Buckley, who stepped down from his position as Collingwood senior coach in his 10th year having made a Grand Final in 2018, said the history could weigh on a club but the Power were in good shape under Hinkley.
“You can view it in terms of tenure and time and that is what everyone does, I suppose, you start to wonder if you haven’t done it by now when it is going to happen,” he said.
“But I think you have to look at the whole club, is it in good shape, have you recruited well, is your conditioning in the right space, are you preparing players well, how are you playing the game, how are you performing against the best teams – the other top four teams in the comp.
“Because you can be winning games but you are not preparing yourself to be winning finals.
“But Ken is a bloody good coach and I think the relationships are pretty strong. The expectations are high externally but I don’t think they would be any higher than his internal expectations, he sets the bar pretty high.”
Buckley has experienced the expectations of the Port Adelaide faithful, albeit when the club was still in the SANFL.
He said that could galvanise the side.
“Port has always expected success and that has always been a part of their history, so their fans want it.
“But that is not a bad thing to have, that pressure can be really positive at times, but it can be debilitating as well.
“But that is something, if you have been involved with Port Adelaide, you manage, and I think they will have a strong year.”
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