Eddie McGuire blows up at Port Adelaide’s ‘Prison Bars’ guernsey win in epic rant

Eddie McGuire has blown up in an all-time rant over Collingwood’s backflip in its longstanding guernsey stoush with Port Adelaide.

Eddie McGuire believes the decision to allow Port Adelaide to wear its heritage jumper will see the Power wear the ‘Prison Bars’ more often.

Now the former Collingwood boss is taking a pointed swipe at Port’s CEO.

Port Adelaide and Collingwood announced over the weekend they had reached an agreement for the Power to wear their heritage black and white jumper in the Round 3 Showdown against the Adelaide Crows.

For now the agreement is just for this season but Port Adelaide president David Koch is hopeful of continuing “our positive discussions with Collingwood in regards to wearing our black-and-white Prison Bar guernsey again next year and beyond”.

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The announcement ended years of stalemate between Port and Collingwood, and McGuire and Koch.

The Magpies had been reluctant to let the Power wear the heritage guernsey because its thin white and black stripes bear resemblance to Collingwood’s classic jumper.

Collingwood repeatedly pushed back on the Power’s requests and called for them to wear the heritage jumper with teal stripes as a compromise.

But McGuire, who was Collingwood president before stepping down in 2021, isn’t overly impressed with his club’s decision to “sell the (Magpies) jumper in that regard”.

Speaking on 3AW’s Eddie and Jimmy podcast, McGuire said “the toothpaste is out of the tube”, arguing Port Adelaide will soon by wearing the ‘Prison Bars’ jersey more than once a year.

Port Adelaide will be allowed to wear their traditional prison bar guernsey in round 3 for the showdown against Adelaide. Picture: Simon Cross

“Kochie is a smart guy he gets the marketing and needs to show he’s in there having a go. He takes on the big guys, ‘we’ll have a go at Collingwood’,” McGuire said.

“Now every time Port Adelaide has asked Collingwood when I was the president, we said yes. So let me just let that rattle around. Every time they asked, we said yes.

“What we didn‘t want it to be was every year or every home game – and we could see where it was going. You have a look at the last couple of years, the AFL allowed them to start putting the Magpie – the Collingwood Magpie – on their scarfs and all their merchandise.”

McGuire claimed the statements released by Port Adelaide and Collingwood about their Round 2 clash shows new Magpies president Jeff Browne decided to effectively sell the rights for Port to wear the jersey in a financial “transaction”.

McGuire said: “Port Adelaide’s statement from David Koch said: ‘Port Adelaide would continue talks with Collingwood with the view of wearing the guernsey in every home Showdown moving forward’ – so straightaway it‘s now once a year, as opposed to special occasions – ‘and encourage members and supporters to head to the MCG for the Round 2 match against Collingwood.’

“Collingwood’s press releases on the last paragraph: ‘Collingwood, in conjunction with Port Adelaide, will be putting on buses from Adelaide to Melbourne with details around travel options to be communicated directly to football supporters in the coming days.’

“What does that read to you? It reads to me that they‘re underwriting attendances at the Collingwood-Port Adelaide game at the MCG. So there is a sale on here, there is a transaction.

“And I reckon what Jeff Browne’s done – and good on him – is that he knows that more than anything, Gill McLachlan wants to go out with Port Adelaide wearing the black-and-white jumper at a Showdown, because he’s been driving me mad about it for years. He’s going to get that and I reckon Jeff Browne will do a deal somewhere else that will be solid for Collingwood.

Eddie McGuire is fuming. (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos)

“So they‘ve decided to sell the jumper in that regard. Jeff, because of the contracts that are in place, does have the final say going forward.

“I think the toothpaste is out of the tube and they’ll be wearing it at their home games going forward, both their Showdown game and probably they’ll come up with another one.

“One last thing: No one ever in these conversations – because in Adelaide, the press are sycophants over there and do whatever they want for the for the local sides, and in Melbourne anything that gees up Collingwood supporters is clickbait and you go with it, and most of the people in the AFL media if they don’t barrack for Collingwood hate the Pies – no one ever had any concern for the Collingwood supporters, who have bought that jumper, stayed with that jumper, didn‘t sell that jumper and have worn it from the very first game. I just find that a bit sad.”

“Good luck to them (Port Adelaide). I would have thought black-and-teal was a good compromise.”

In a final dig, McGuire urged the Power to “drop the Prison Bars reference”.

“I think it‘s a really bad reference in the current lifestyle that we’re all in,” he said.

“I just don’t think it’s good for the demographic that we’re all involved in and go back to what originally was – and that was the ‘piers’ of Port Adelaide. It had nothing to do with prison bars.”

McGuire also took a swipe at Port Adelaide CEO Matthew Richardson, who recently said the club would be able to sell a few of its heritage jumpers now, before saying: “This isn’t about money.”

“Now I won‘t say he’s lying, but I wouldn’t say he is telling the truth,” McGuire said.

The teal jersey Port Adelaide usually wears. (Photo by Sarah Reed/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

Collingwood’s iconic black and white stripes. (Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

In a seven-minute podcast rant, McGuire explained the history of the black-and-white jumper agreement, his frustration with the AFL and the fact “everyone wants to get back to their original jumper”.

“This is a very Australian thing where people look at it and brush it off and don‘t look a bit further than scratching the surface. This is a lot more than just about whether Port Adelaide wore the jumper. This was about the AFL not protecting the copyright of its clubs and continuing to take away the power from the clubs,” McGuire said.

“This goes back to North Melbourne wearing a Wizard (Cup) jumper against Collingwood where they ran out wearing black socks, black shorts and white and orange stripes where you could almost not see what was going on and playing against them.

“I’m not the president of Collingwood anymore. Jeff Browne is and Craig Kelly is the CEO. So they‘re there to make the decisions that they need to make.

“Port came into the competition, no Magpie – that was out. Power, teal – that was what they were all about because, quite simply, they realised that if they came in as the Port Adelaide Magpies, they‘d get no other supporters and the Adelaide Crows would get everything. It’d be like if we decided only to have two teams out of Melbourne now – Collingwood and a combined side – the power of that other side would just be so big, particularly if they came in ahead of time. And don’t forget there was a lot of antipathy towards Port Adelaide because they broke away from the SANFL in trying to get into the AFL in the first place.

We could see the Prison Bars more often in coming years. Picture Simon Cross

“In the ‘90s, Port Adelaide came to me personally and to Collingwood and said: ‘Help, we want to get as far away as we can from Magpies and black-and-white as we possibly can. Will you help us play a game on our home ground where we wear an all-teal jumper? “Vodafone will sponsor us, we’ll make money out of this message … We need to get women and the agnostics looking at Port Adelaide and we want the money from Vodafone.’ Yep, no problem, that‘s fine.

“The AFL at that stage were also pushing for Collingwood to have an away jumper. Now have you seen a clash jumper that looks any good? Never. So we were fighting for that.

“Now all these years later … everyone wants to get back to their original jumper.”