Port Adelaide’s return to Shanghai has many agendas off the field, but a key mission on the park as well

PORT Adelaide makes its second trip to Shanghai to play for AFL premiership points with that goal seeming more than the Power’s ‘China Strategy’.

Port Adelaide returns to Shanghai this week with the Power’s need for consistency on the field having more prominence than the club’s “China Strategy” — the off-field plan to find financial backing outside of the crowded Australian market. Picture: Sarah Reed.

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IT does not seem as exotic nor as mysterious this time as the red Sherrins are packed for Shanghai.

Port Adelaide’s football department will be grateful it has become just another “road trip”, albeit the longest on the AFL fixture. Unlike last season — when former Gold Coast coach Rodney Eade put a heavy tone of despair on the Suns’ willingness to play in China — there has not been a seemingless endless run of doubts about the game that will be the most-watched in AFL history.

The Power and Sun players run onto the field during last year’s inaugural clash at Jiangwan Stadium in Shanghai, China. Picture: AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy

No questions about the turf at Jiangwan Stadium. No headlines about any risk to the players with Shanghai’s noted air pollution. No question about how many injections the players have needed (none, by the way). And no fear that some red button will be pushed in North Korea, not now that “Little Rocket Man” Kim Jong Un has offered an olive branch to US President Donald Trump.

Port Adelaide’s “China Strategy” — designed to find big money in Australia’s major trading partner to save the club from financial crises as it suffered from 2008-12 — remains a long-term goal with the Power looking at a preliminary five-year stay in Shanghai. How the AFL adds its international agenda — particularly with the short-form AFLX game — to Port Adelaide’s China ambition could be fascinating in the next six months.

But for the next six days, the return to the Silk Road does become about football — and how Port Adelaide avoids the “let-down after a Showdown”.

The Power has not had to deal with the challenge of parking the euphoria of a derby win since May 2015. The let-down after victory in a Showdown did strike then with a loss to West Coast at Adelaide Oval — just as it did in 2014 with a loss to North Melbourne at Etihad Stadium.

Losing to Gold Coast in Shanghai would leave coach Ken Hinkley to wonder just what will it take to remove the “inconsistent” tag from the Power.

“This is a tough competition; the AFL ladder is incredibly tight,” Hinkley said as the five-point Showdown win put his team back in the top-eight with a 5-3 record. “We will win and lose games for the rest of the year ... but we have a way that we know works — and that is the key for us.

“We have to remind ourselves regularly.

Stuart Dew and Kane Cornes in Port’s premiership season.

Port Adelaide captain Travis Boak in Shanghai last year. Picture Sarah Reed

“It goes without saying (that Port Adelaide must back up the Showdown win to advance to 6-3 before taking its in-season break). That’s the AFL season ... if you don’t back up and put wins together, you are going to find it pretty tough.”

Gold Coast, under a new coach Stuart Dew, who is well known to Port Adelaide by his tenure at the club as a premiership player, is far better prepared for this trip to Shanghai than last year when it lost by 72 points.

The Suns might not be in great form with five losses in the past six weeks and major headaches from the match review office at the weekend.

But, even in China, football can be a funny game.

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Originally published as Port Adelaide’s return to Shanghai has many agendas off the field, but a key mission on the park as well