Port Adelaide Magpies must not be left to fold in the face of financial hardship brought on by coronavirus pandemic
Graham Cornes has enjoyed a fierce rivalry with Port Adelaide throughout his football life. But love them or hate them, an SANFL competition without the Magpies would be disastrous, he says.
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It was supposed to be both a celebration of a glorious 150-year history and the anticipation of a prosperous future.
Instead, with every passing day, it seems increasingly likely that 2020 will be the year that the famous Port Adelaide Magpies disintegrated and disappeared. Surely not!
Even those of us who have loathed the club and waged war with them over the decades can’t imagine a football life without the Port Magpies.
Many times we may have wished it upon them, but as the old saying goes: “be careful what you wish for”.
For as much as we have hated them (in the football sense of the word hate), they are a part of us, whether we like it or not.
For over a century and a half, every South Australian football supporter has had their football lives impacted by that traditional club.
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Of course there have been many football rivalries, but regardless of the South Australian football club that you have followed, the rivalry that mattered most was the one with the Port Magpies.
The triumph when you beat them was so much greater; the devastation of losing to them was deeper and more humiliating.
Of course, they were never humble in victory.
They were an arrogant, boastful mob that flaunted their successes and trampled all over the emotions of their rivals.
Which football tribe doesn’t behave like that? However, they were louder, more visible and more arrogant than any.
As this coronavirus pandemic wreaks havoc, destroys lives, livelihoods and traditional institutions, we all face an uncertain future.
Yes, there is optimism for recovery and rejuvenation and we will emerge from the darkness, but so much will change.
One of the changes will be to our AFL football clubs as they strive for new efficiencies.
The excesses in the coaching, fitness and medical staffs will be trimmed and playing lists will be reduced – perhaps to as low as 35.
Both Port Adelaide and the Crows will be impacted.
It will be impossible to have reserve AFL teams participating in the SANFL.
The old system where the AFL players are allocated out to SANFL clubs will have to be reintroduced.
The public statements from the key people at Port Adelaide have thus far skirted around the issue.
Perhaps they genuinely don’t know, but it seems obvious.
In the month before our world shifted beneath us, the Port Adelaide Football Club held the biggest function in the club’s history to kick-off this intended year of celebration.
Those who attended – the true believers – say it was the best, most moving event in the club’s history. The rest of us silently gagged.
To us, frustrated that our opinions didn’t really matter, it seemed a jingoistic excess of arrogance and braggadocio.
The beatification of Bruce Weber was completed, his memory further enshrined and legends from all eras celebrated.
A compelling documentary was produced to further encapsulate, enhance and preserve the club’s history.
For some inexplicable reason I was asked to contribute to the video and subsequently interviewed for 45 minutes about the love/hate relationship of someone who had been a supporter as a kid, a bitter opponent as a player and the father of two sons who made their careers wearing a Port Adelaide jumper.
That 45 minutes was cut to eleven seconds in the final production, although the Port faithful say even that was 11 seconds too long.
One of the questions I was asked that didn’t make the final cut was: “what does Port Adelaide mean to you?”
It’s a question that evokes a torrent of conflicting emotions.
A seven-year-old kid who had barracked for Collingwood was always going to barrack for Port when his family moved from Melbourne to Adelaide.
Port Adelaide meant Fos Williams, Rexy Johns and Ken Tierney.
Later it was Ian Hannaford, big Reggie Beaufoy and Peter Mead kicking a goal to win a preliminary final.
Then came a confusing time when those legends that I had revered – “Sambo” Salmon, Keith Spencer, Ron Elleway and John Cahill – were suddenly opponents in opposition jumper, intent on your physical destruction.
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Later came the on-field rivalry and respect.
Russell Ebert was complete, both as an opponent and a teammate.
Max James, Bruce Light both great players, and big John Spry, who came within seconds of strangling me in that grand final, are part of the tapestry.
And yes – David Granger. We played on each other often enough to have a healthy respect and his ultimate demise, while it may have been in part, self-inflicted is a great sadness.
However, my favourite of all time, although I never saw him play, was the heroic Bob Quinn. He won a Magarey Medal before the war in which he was wounded and decorated, a second Magarey Medal after the war, was a premiership, state and All Australian captain.
He surely has a record that no other footballer can emulate.
Then the irony of having Chad and Kane realise their football dreams in a Port Adelaide jumper further added to the emotional confusion of one who always wanted to hate the jumper.
However, despite all that history, the future is clouded and uncertain.
If there is to be a Port Adelaide Power, how will the Magpies survive?
The ever jocular Bob Philp, another of my favourite Port players, recalled the story this week of the time Russell Ebert was not reappointed as the Port coach.
“Fifteen hundred people marched from Alberton Oval down Port Road to the Lighthouse Hotel in protest”, he said.
“If they shut the Magpies down there’ll be 15,000 marching this time.”
The sentiment is admirable and the history is overpowering, but reality is fast kicking in. Football now can’t afford both the Magpies and the Power and if a choice has to be made there can only be one outcome. Sad.
Originally published as Port Adelaide Magpies must not be left to fold in the face of financial hardship brought on by coronavirus pandemic