Port Adelaide still expects a major play for Chad Wingard in AFL trade period this month as it prepares to welcome Scott Lycett
PORT Adelaide knows Chad Wingard would prefer to stay at Alberton. But the Power — and his management — know he would move if offered $1 million a season, as the club prepares to roll out the welcome mat to a premiership ruckman.
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CHAD Wingard is still “preferring” to be a Port Adelaide player, but that will change if the contracted midfielder-forward can become the latest AFL footballer earning $1 million a season.
And the Western Bulldogs remain the club most interested in giving Wingard the long-term deal — with a million-dollar annual salary — to open the door for a major play in this month’s AFL trade period.
West Coast ruckman Scott Lycett certainly will be at the Power next year with his free-agency move to be confirmed after the Eagles’ premiership celebrations wind down in Perth.
Wingard’s status at Alberton — where he is contracted for next season, after which he becomes a free agent — remains clouded in uncertainty.
Port Adelaide says it has had no definitive call from Wingard, who has been courted by the Bulldogs and Hawthorn since the Power declared its willingness to consider a trade before the 25-year-old South Australian becomes a free agent.
Wingard’s management says all reports that the Power’s 2013 club champion has told Port Adelaide he intends to stay at Alberton are overstating his intent. His manager Tom Petroro said on Monday that Wingard remains undecided on his future.
Consistent in Wingard’s statements to Power is the line he would “prefer to stay at Port Adelaide”.
But Wingard’s other preference is to strike a long-term deal that pays him around $1 million a season — a figure Port Adelaide will not offer to the 147-game enigma. The Power’s best offer to extend Wingard’s contract beyond free agency would be $800,000 a season.
Hawthorn, the other AFL club eager on Wingard to answer coach Alastair Clarkson’s wish to add class to his list, also will not (and cannot) work to beyond $800,000 a year. The Hawks also cannot put a significant trade deal to Port Adelaide that will demand a first-round draft pick and more for Wingard.
The AFL trade period opens on Friday — when Port Adelaide will have its club champion count — with the free-agency window opening.
The Power should at this time be able to declare Lycett’s return to Alberton where he played for the Port Adelaide Magpies in the SANFL before West Coast claimed him at No. 29 in the 2010 national draft.
The Advertiser understands Lycett, who at the weekend revealed his problems with a hip injury late in the AFL season, has passed a medical to satisfy Port Adelaide.
West Coast is not intending to match the Power’s offer to Lycett who is a restricted free agent.
The AFL trade period turns to non-free agents and draft picks from Monday when the 18 AFL clubs will gather at Etihad Stadium to work their trade bait and needs.
Port Adelaide’s meeting with the Western Bulldogs already has been prefaced by Power coach Ken Hinkley declaring a high price tag for Wingard — and well beyond Wingard’s price of a seven-figure salary.
“Chad’s an enormous talent,” Hinkley said last week. “He’s not the type of player that you let out of your football club very easily.
“I suspect (Wingard’s) pretty valuable and if I go through what I’ve dealt with in the past with (trades for) Paddy Ryder and Charlie Dixon, and we’ve given up first-round picks and a second-round pick and they’re the sort of numbers — two first round picks.
“But it’s not my decision, that’ll be made by the list management team.”
michelangelo.rucci@news.com.au