Tom Rockliff stands firm with his demanding tone to win place in Port Adelaide leadership group

TOM Rockliff - Port Adelaide’s free-agent gain from the October market - is part of the Power’s seven-man leadership group before playing an AFL game for his new club

WINNING. Tom Rockliff, right in training with fellow midfielder Robbie Gray, has won over his new Port Adelaide team-mates with his strong desire for success. He is part of the new Power leadership group before playing a game with his new club. Picture: Ben Macmahon (AAP)

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TOM Rockliff is part of a new-look Port Adelaide leadership group having won over his new team-mates with a demanding, uncompromising tone for success.

Rockliff, 27, has joined the seven-man Power leadership panel before playing a game for the AFL club - and without changing his ways after losing the Brisbane captaincy last year.

“I’ve been myself throughout the pre-season,” Rockliff said at Alberton on Wednesday after the presentation of Travis Boak as Power captain for the sixth consecutive year.

“I came (from Brisbane as a free agent) with no expectation to be in this role. As it panned out, the boys voted for that (place on the leadership group).”

That appreciation from his new team-mates - along with his personal goals being strongly aligned with Port Adelaide’s want for an AFL flag - has given Rockliff new drive.

“I feel rejuvenated,” said Rockliff who will make his first appearance for the Power at an internal trial at Alberton on Saturday.

“I am refreshed. I have a new lease on life - and my footy will blossom this year among this playing group.”

Rockliff came from the Lions branded by the perception of being - with his ambitious ways - a divisive player. But Boak and his Power team-mates have found Rockliff’s actions and desire at Alberton to fit perfectly with their own goals.

“Straight way we could see why (Tom) captained Brisbane,” Boak said. “He was first in the club every day. He is demanding on the track.

“He wants to win. He wants to compete. He wants the group to be better.

“We are so lucky to have him. It was hard to keep him out of the leadership group - from Day One (of his arrival at Alberton), you could see why he is a leader.”

Rockliff won enthusiastic support in a player vote to join Boak’s leadership group as a new voice along with key forward Charlie Dixon. They join vice-captain Ollie Wines, midfielder Brad Ebert and defenders Hamish Hartlett and Tom Jonas in the panel that has expanded from six to seven this season while losing utility Jackson Trengove who has moved to the Western Bulldogs.

Key recruit, Tom Rockliff in action during Port Adelaide pre-season training at Alberton Oval.

Rockliff accepted his nomination after being offered the right to pass up a leadership role.

“They left it up to me,” Rockliff said. “They asked if I wanted that pressure coming in (to a new team). I said I am here to win - and to perform any role they want me to.

“That (role) is in the leadership group - and I think I have something to provide.”

Rockliff arrived at Alberton in October - after Brisbane failed to trade him in the 2016 market while clubs such as Adelaide carried concerns with his caustic reputation - staying true to the themes that made him an All-Australian in 2014 and Lions club champion in 2011 and 2014.

Rockliff’s vote of faith from his new Power team-mates has become a reassuring note for one of Port Adelaide’s prize recruits.

“I’ve come in and naturally been myself and trained the way I always have and behaved with in the four walls (of the club) in the way I always have,” Rockliff said. “To be acknowledged (positively) for that is rewarding, but it is about winning games of footy - and building on the foundations left by the players before me.”

Boak dismissed the “baggage” that came with Rockliff’s free-agency move from Brisbane where the midfielder played 154 AFL games after his national league debut in 2009.

“I knew (by a long-established friendship) that Tom was a quality person,” Boak said. “And a quality leader.

“But now I have seen even more about how good he is. I knew he was good. Now I see why he has been a quality player in the competition for a long time.”

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