Port Adelaide Magpies fans and players in shock as they face a likely sudden end

PORT Adelaide Magpies players and supporters say they are shattered their SANFL side is likely to play its final game at Alberton Oval on Sunday.

Port Adelaide Magpies players and supporters say they are shattered their suburban-based SANFL side is likely to play its final game at Alberton Oval on Sunday.

Players have been told the club wants to field an AFL reserves team in place of the stand-alone Magpies in the league next season.

The Magpie cheer squad has vowed it will disband regardless of whether the Power reserves side called itself the Magpies and played in Port's famed prison-bar guernsey.

The move would mean any Port Adelaide team in the SANFL from 2014 will be predominantly made up of players on the Power's AFL list. It is unclear how vacant spots in the side will be filled.

It was also unclear what would happen to the Magpies' junior zones in the Port Adelaide, Salisbury and Eyre Peninsula areas beyond 2014.

Retiring Magpies captain James Meiklejohn confirmed Port Adelaide's AFL chief executive Keith Thomas addressed players last week and told them the club was considering a move to field an AFL reserves team in the SANFL next season.

Meiklejohn said the structure under which the Power's reserves would play was unclear but players had accepted the side would replace the current Magpies - leaving dozens of players in limbo.

"Obviously there are a few things still to sort out but the feeling is these will be the last two games in 143 years of the Magpies in this sense,'' said Meiklejohn, who received a personal briefing from Thomas last week.

"It won't be the same set up as this year. The make up of the league team will be different and the SANFL guys won't know how many spots will be available."

Port Adelaide returns to the negotiation table with the SA Football Commission this week.

Thomas said he understood players' frustration.

"They are significantly affected by this decision," he said yesterday.

"Our current position is if we can't have our junior structure in place, then it will be status quo for 2014.

Thomas said there was no way around the reality that having all Power players together at the Magpies would reduce the number of opportunities for non-AFL listed players.

The Magpies play West Adelaide at Alberton this Sunday, before playing what will likely be their final match in their current format on September 7, against Glenelg at the Bay.

Long-term Magpies cheer squad leader Harold Wilson said he and the squad's 67 members were devastated.

Wilson, a member for 38 years, said the cheer squad would disband at the end of the season. "We thought this would happen but we thought they could have come up with a better outcome for the club," Mr Wilson, from Pennington, said.

"We've been involved with the club since 1966 - outside of my work and family, it is my life.

"Every weekend is spent following the team around.

"My kids, family, grandkids and friends all support the Magpies and it is something that has been part of all our life for decades."

Mr Wilson does not support the Power and said he would have no association with the club from next season. He said the cheer squad would not protest, or officially send the Magpies off at Alberton on Sunday.

The cheer squad was planning a special farewell the following weekend at Glenelg, Mr Wilson said.

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