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PAFC CEO Matthew Richardson

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tribey said:
welp, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t received any form of reply, so I’m going to assume he either instabinned it or it was automatically filtered out,

so this is what I sent to his club email address after receiving that binjuice ‘from the CEO’ mail of September 5:

View attachment 2423098

Matthew,

I’m going to cut to the chase. This part of your recent missive was nauseating.

I’m roundly sick and tired of hearing Mandela Effect-tier nonsense about how bad things supposedly were in 2012 (we didn’t even finish bottom-four!), particularly when shamelessly utilised as a ready crutch to lean on in the event of failures in the present. Time and again. Year after year. And I’m telling you, I’m not the only one.

As if Ken Hinkley didn’t walk into the plum situation of a freshly cashed-up football department and an exciting young playing list brimming with potential just begging to be unlocked.

As if Adelaide Oval wasn’t already greenlit and instead, its agreed redevelopment and associated restructure of South Australian football governance somehow hinged on Port winning 13 games out of 24 in 2013.

All told, a tantalising situation a world away from that endured by his predecessor, Matthew Primus. Who would’ve killed to have Alan Richardson and Darren Burgess at his left and right hand on day one, to help develop the likes of Boak, Gray, Wingard, Jonas and Hartlett and others, but the funds within the AFL’s previously agreed rescue package were denied to him.

We are a football club with a 155-year history of being one of the national game’s foremost institutions, renowned for the ruthless pursuit of excellence that not only resulted in 34 senior premierships and 4 national titles at SANFL level from 1877-1996, but saw us hit the ground running at AFL level — winning more games than any other club in our first eleven years in the national competition, and securing our one and only flag at the highest level.

Why then, is there such an urge to hyperfocus and fixate on the relative blip of 2010-12? As if Port were the only club to ever endure a temporary nadir on and off-field? Hear me out:

• As the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2000, Collingwood were millions of dollars in debt and the reigning wooden spooners. What’s more, just hours earlier a young Brendan Fevola had booted 12 goals for Carlton en route to a 88pt smashing of the Pies in the so-called ‘Millennium Match’.

• In 1996, the destitute Hawks almost merged as subordinate partner with Melbourne. They were 2,401 members’ votes away from extinction. All this a mere 5 years after their extraordinary run of 5 flags from 8 Grand Final appearances in 9 seasons (1983-1991).

Now apart from this email, when have these calamities ever been mentioned by anyone, let alone pushed by Collingwood or Hawthorn themselves every time it’s contemporarily convenient to make excuses for a poor season, or an upset September defeat, or any time the current coach is on the hotseat?

But at Port, our nadir is all we ever hear about, often free of context and with varying degrees of factual accuracy:

• “I guess you forget when Ken arrived!”
• “There were tarps on the seats!”
• “There was talk the club would be wound up!”
• “The club was broken!”
• “Nobody wanted to coach us!”
• “Everybody wanted to leave!”

Read this next bit back a good 3 or 4 times so it sinks in: Who cares?! It was 13+ years ago!

Revisionist, defeatist, failure-apologia such as this is a self-fulfilling millstone around the club’s neck, and anathema to a proud, confident, culture of winning and genuine success. And for emphasis: finishing top-2 and earning a home Prelim in back-to-back years only to miss the Grand Final twice (2020/21), is anything but.

Talk of ‘punching above our weight (you)’ and being a ‘little battler club from Alberton (Koch)’ is cut from the same cloth.

Cosplay as a minnow — we most certainly are not and never have been in what is a salary-capped league predicated on a draft — and you’ll perform like one.

Port people want to be inspired and dream big. Not be constantly marinated in misery, embarrassment and excuses while being relentlessly gaslighted with nonsense purporting that the Ken Hinkley Era was a wonderful decade or so to look back on with great fondness and pride actually, and that near enough is good enough.

“We never gave up”? The most recent Showdown and the string of disastrous home finals over the years begs to differ.

Ultimately, Port people have long memories, aren’t stupid, and are tired of being patronised and treated as such. Thus,

• Instil some pride in who we existentially are. Not what we are now relative to how bad things may or may not have been when today’s high school graduates were in kindergarten.

• Set some realistic goals (not hollow ones that only serve to embarrass us like ‘Chasing Greatness’ does). Actual consequences for failure. Don’t move the goalposts post-hoc with rationale such as ‘well nobody expected us to finish top-4!’ after blowing a home final by a record margin as Koch has done in the past.

• Draw some actual red lines. Actual consequences for transgression.

• Stop lionising mediocrity and gaslighting failure.

• Be honest. eg. Maybe don’t be afraid of admitting that getting smashed in a home Prelim against a squad of hotel detainees was unacceptable and a shameful disgrace instead of patting players on the head, pretending it was all a bit of bad luck, and just hoping that things will be different next time.

• If a certain player or coach bristles at hearing some home truths, they can always see if St. Kilda’s or South Adelaide’s hiring, etc.

• Oh, and this might seem pedantically churlish, but if you bring in a recruit as a salary dump, who previously antagonised Port fans while playing for the Crows in a Showdown, and he only plays 2 games for us in less than 12 months — they probably don’t need 3 days of retirement posts across the club’s myriad social media pages.

We are Port Adelaide. For the love of god, Start acting like it.

Regards,

Tribiscus O’Malley III
(Platinum Member # xxxxxxx)
Click to expand...
Oh Tribiscus how I love thee!!!
 
tribey said:
welp, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t received any form of reply, so I’m going to assume he either instabinned it or it was automatically filtered out,

so this is what I sent to his club email address after receiving that binjuice ‘from the CEO’ mail of September 5:

View attachment 2423098

Matthew,

I’m going to cut to the chase. This part of your recent missive was nauseating.

I’m roundly sick and tired of hearing Mandela Effect-tier nonsense about how bad things supposedly were in 2012 (we didn’t even finish bottom-four!), particularly when shamelessly utilised as a ready crutch to lean on in the event of failures in the present. Time and again. Year after year. And I’m telling you, I’m not the only one.

As if Ken Hinkley didn’t walk into the plum situation of a freshly cashed-up football department and an exciting young playing list brimming with potential just begging to be unlocked.

As if Adelaide Oval wasn’t already greenlit and instead, its agreed redevelopment and associated restructure of South Australian football governance somehow hinged on Port winning 13 games out of 24 in 2013.

All told, a tantalising situation a world away from that endured by his predecessor, Matthew Primus. Who would’ve killed to have Alan Richardson and Darren Burgess at his left and right hand on day one, to help develop the likes of Boak, Gray, Wingard, Jonas and Hartlett and others, but the funds within the AFL’s previously agreed rescue package were denied to him.

We are a football club with a 155-year history of being one of the national game’s foremost institutions, renowned for the ruthless pursuit of excellence that not only resulted in 34 senior premierships and 4 national titles at SANFL level from 1877-1996, but saw us hit the ground running at AFL level — winning more games than any other club in our first eleven years in the national competition, and securing our one and only flag at the highest level.

Why then, is there such an urge to hyperfocus and fixate on the relative blip of 2010-12? As if Port were the only club to ever endure a temporary nadir on and off-field? Hear me out:

• As the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2000, Collingwood were millions of dollars in debt and the reigning wooden spooners. What’s more, just hours earlier a young Brendan Fevola had booted 12 goals for Carlton en route to a 88pt smashing of the Pies in the so-called ‘Millennium Match’.

• In 1996, the destitute Hawks almost merged as subordinate partner with Melbourne. They were 2,401 members’ votes away from extinction. All this a mere 5 years after their extraordinary run of 5 flags from 8 Grand Final appearances in 9 seasons (1983-1991).

Now apart from this email, when have these calamities ever been mentioned by anyone, let alone pushed by Collingwood or Hawthorn themselves every time it’s contemporarily convenient to make excuses for a poor season, or an upset September defeat, or any time the current coach is on the hotseat?

But at Port, our nadir is all we ever hear about, often free of context and with varying degrees of factual accuracy:

• “I guess you forget when Ken arrived!”
• “There were tarps on the seats!”
• “There was talk the club would be wound up!”
• “The club was broken!”
• “Nobody wanted to coach us!”
• “Everybody wanted to leave!”

Read this next bit back a good 3 or 4 times so it sinks in: Who cares?! It was 13+ years ago!

Revisionist, defeatist, failure-apologia such as this is a self-fulfilling millstone around the club’s neck, and anathema to a proud, confident, culture of winning and genuine success. And for emphasis: finishing top-2 and earning a home Prelim in back-to-back years only to miss the Grand Final twice (2020/21), is anything but.

Talk of ‘punching above our weight (you)’ and being a ‘little battler club from Alberton (Koch)’ is cut from the same cloth.

Cosplay as a minnow — we most certainly are not and never have been in what is a salary-capped league predicated on a draft — and you’ll perform like one.

Port people want to be inspired and dream big. Not be constantly marinated in misery, embarrassment and excuses while being relentlessly gaslighted with nonsense purporting that the Ken Hinkley Era was a wonderful decade or so to look back on with great fondness and pride actually, and that near enough is good enough.

“We never gave up”? The most recent Showdown and the string of disastrous home finals over the years begs to differ.

Ultimately, Port people have long memories, aren’t stupid, and are tired of being patronised and treated as such. Thus,

• Instil some pride in who we existentially are. Not what we are now relative to how bad things may or may not have been when today’s high school graduates were in kindergarten.

• Set some realistic goals (not hollow ones that only serve to embarrass us like ‘Chasing Greatness’ does). Actual consequences for failure. Don’t move the goalposts post-hoc with rationale such as ‘well nobody expected us to finish top-4!’ after blowing a home final by a record margin as Koch has done in the past.

• Draw some actual red lines. Actual consequences for transgression.

• Stop lionising mediocrity and gaslighting failure.

• Be honest. eg. Maybe don’t be afraid of admitting that getting smashed in a home Prelim against a squad of hotel detainees was unacceptable and a shameful disgrace instead of patting players on the head, pretending it was all a bit of bad luck, and just hoping that things will be different next time.

• If a certain player or coach bristles at hearing some home truths, they can always see if St. Kilda’s or South Adelaide’s hiring, etc.

• Oh, and this might seem pedantically churlish, but if you bring in a recruit as a salary dump, who previously antagonised Port fans while playing for the Crows in a Showdown, and he only plays 2 games for us in less than 12 months — they probably don’t need 3 days of retirement posts across the club’s myriad social media pages.

We are Port Adelaide. For the love of god, Start acting like it.

Regards,

Tribiscus O’Malley III
(Platinum Member # xxxxxxx)
Click to expand...
Brilliant.
 

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tribey said:
welp, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t received any form of reply, so I’m going to assume he either instabinned it or it was automatically filtered out,

so this is what I sent to his club email address after receiving that binjuice ‘from the CEO’ mail of September 5:

View attachment 2423098

Matthew,

I’m going to cut to the chase. This part of your recent missive was nauseating.

I’m roundly sick and tired of hearing Mandela Effect-tier nonsense about how bad things supposedly were in 2012 (we didn’t even finish bottom-four!), particularly when shamelessly utilised as a ready crutch to lean on in the event of failures in the present. Time and again. Year after year. And I’m telling you, I’m not the only one.

As if Ken Hinkley didn’t walk into the plum situation of a freshly cashed-up football department and an exciting young playing list brimming with potential just begging to be unlocked.

As if Adelaide Oval wasn’t already greenlit and instead, its agreed redevelopment and associated restructure of South Australian football governance somehow hinged on Port winning 13 games out of 24 in 2013.

All told, a tantalising situation a world away from that endured by his predecessor, Matthew Primus. Who would’ve killed to have Alan Richardson and Darren Burgess at his left and right hand on day one, to help develop the likes of Boak, Gray, Wingard, Jonas and Hartlett and others, but the funds within the AFL’s previously agreed rescue package were denied to him.

We are a football club with a 155-year history of being one of the national game’s foremost institutions, renowned for the ruthless pursuit of excellence that not only resulted in 34 senior premierships and 4 national titles at SANFL level from 1877-1996, but saw us hit the ground running at AFL level — winning more games than any other club in our first eleven years in the national competition, and securing our one and only flag at the highest level.

Why then, is there such an urge to hyperfocus and fixate on the relative blip of 2010-12? As if Port were the only club to ever endure a temporary nadir on and off-field? Hear me out:

• As the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2000, Collingwood were millions of dollars in debt and the reigning wooden spooners. What’s more, just hours earlier a young Brendan Fevola had booted 12 goals for Carlton en route to a 88pt smashing of the Pies in the so-called ‘Millennium Match’.

• In 1996, the destitute Hawks almost merged as subordinate partner with Melbourne. They were 2,401 members’ votes away from extinction. All this a mere 5 years after their extraordinary run of 5 flags from 8 Grand Final appearances in 9 seasons (1983-1991).

Now apart from this email, when have these calamities ever been mentioned by anyone, let alone pushed by Collingwood or Hawthorn themselves every time it’s contemporarily convenient to make excuses for a poor season, or an upset September defeat, or any time the current coach is on the hotseat?

But at Port, our nadir is all we ever hear about, often free of context and with varying degrees of factual accuracy:

• “I guess you forget when Ken arrived!”
• “There were tarps on the seats!”
• “There was talk the club would be wound up!”
• “The club was broken!”
• “Nobody wanted to coach us!”
• “Everybody wanted to leave!”

Read this next bit back a good 3 or 4 times so it sinks in: Who cares?! It was 13+ years ago!

Revisionist, defeatist, failure-apologia such as this is a self-fulfilling millstone around the club’s neck, and anathema to a proud, confident, culture of winning and genuine success. And for emphasis: finishing top-2 and earning a home Prelim in back-to-back years only to miss the Grand Final twice (2020/21), is anything but.

Talk of ‘punching above our weight (you)’ and being a ‘little battler club from Alberton (Koch)’ is cut from the same cloth.

Cosplay as a minnow — we most certainly are not and never have been in what is a salary-capped league predicated on a draft — and you’ll perform like one.

Port people want to be inspired and dream big. Not be constantly marinated in misery, embarrassment and excuses while being relentlessly gaslighted with nonsense purporting that the Ken Hinkley Era was a wonderful decade or so to look back on with great fondness and pride actually, and that near enough is good enough.

“We never gave up”? The most recent Showdown and the string of disastrous home finals over the years begs to differ.

Ultimately, Port people have long memories, aren’t stupid, and are tired of being patronised and treated as such. Thus,

• Instil some pride in who we existentially are. Not what we are now relative to how bad things may or may not have been when today’s high school graduates were in kindergarten.

• Set some realistic goals (not hollow ones that only serve to embarrass us like ‘Chasing Greatness’ does). Actual consequences for failure. Don’t move the goalposts post-hoc with rationale such as ‘well nobody expected us to finish top-4!’ after blowing a home final by a record margin as Koch has done in the past.

• Draw some actual red lines. Actual consequences for transgression.

• Stop lionising mediocrity and gaslighting failure.

• Be honest. eg. Maybe don’t be afraid of admitting that getting smashed in a home Prelim against a squad of hotel detainees was unacceptable and a shameful disgrace instead of patting players on the head, pretending it was all a bit of bad luck, and just hoping that things will be different next time.

• If a certain player or coach bristles at hearing some home truths, they can always see if St. Kilda’s or South Adelaide’s hiring, etc.

• Oh, and this might seem pedantically churlish, but if you bring in a recruit as a salary dump, who previously antagonised Port fans while playing for the Crows in a Showdown, and he only plays 2 games for us in less than 12 months — they probably don’t need 3 days of retirement posts across the club’s myriad social media pages.

We are Port Adelaide. For the love of god, Start acting like it.

Regards,

Tribiscus O’Malley III
(Platinum Member # xxxxxxx)
Click to expand...
excited andy samberg GIF
 
As I've said before, it's not the lack of premierships that's the problem, it's the lack of accountability for not even getting the opportunity to win one. A lot of highly talented and well respected football people haven't climbed the mountain, but they have all been held accountable for not making it. Except Donuts & Co. That is where our angst should be directed.
 
Dear Tribiscus,

Thank you for your email and for taking the time to outline your perspective. I can certainly see how deeply you care about Port Adelaide and its history.

I do think, though, that sometimes we put a little too much weight on the past. Yes, the club has a proud tradition in the SANFL and a lot of history behind it, but the reality is that football is very different now. What mattered in the 70s, 80s or even 90s doesn’t necessarily matter in today’s AFL environment.

Our record in the national competition is respectable but, honestly, it’s not as unique or untouchable as we sometimes like to think. Every club has highs and lows. We’ve had one AFL premiership in almost 30 years — so perhaps we need to be more honest about where we actually sit rather than always leaning on a reputation built decades ago in a very different competition.

That’s not to dismiss what came before — it’s just to say that the future is what counts, and our focus has to be on where we’re going rather than where we’ve been.

I appreciate you sharing your views, and as always, thank you for your ongoing commitment as a Platinum member.

Kind regards,
Matthew Richardson
Chief Executive Officer
Port Adelaide Football Club
 

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tribey said:
welp, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t received any form of reply, so I’m going to assume he either instabinned it or it was automatically filtered out,

so this is what I sent to his club email address after receiving that binjuice ‘from the CEO’ mail of September 5:

View attachment 2423098

Matthew,

I’m going to cut to the chase. This part of your recent missive was nauseating.

I’m roundly sick and tired of hearing Mandela Effect-tier nonsense about how bad things supposedly were in 2012 (we didn’t even finish bottom-four!), particularly when shamelessly utilised as a ready crutch to lean on in the event of failures in the present. Time and again. Year after year. And I’m telling you, I’m not the only one.

As if Ken Hinkley didn’t walk into the plum situation of a freshly cashed-up football department and an exciting young playing list brimming with potential just begging to be unlocked.

As if Adelaide Oval wasn’t already greenlit and instead, its agreed redevelopment and associated restructure of South Australian football governance somehow hinged on Port winning 13 games out of 24 in 2013.

All told, a tantalising situation a world away from that endured by his predecessor, Matthew Primus. Who would’ve killed to have Alan Richardson and Darren Burgess at his left and right hand on day one, to help develop the likes of Boak, Gray, Wingard, Jonas and Hartlett and others, but the funds within the AFL’s previously agreed rescue package were denied to him.

We are a football club with a 155-year history of being one of the national game’s foremost institutions, renowned for the ruthless pursuit of excellence that not only resulted in 34 senior premierships and 4 national titles at SANFL level from 1877-1996, but saw us hit the ground running at AFL level — winning more games than any other club in our first eleven years in the national competition, and securing our one and only flag at the highest level.

Why then, is there such an urge to hyperfocus and fixate on the relative blip of 2010-12? As if Port were the only club to ever endure a temporary nadir on and off-field? Hear me out:

• As the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2000, Collingwood were millions of dollars in debt and the reigning wooden spooners. What’s more, just hours earlier a young Brendan Fevola had booted 12 goals for Carlton en route to a 88pt smashing of the Pies in the so-called ‘Millennium Match’.

• In 1996, the destitute Hawks almost merged as subordinate partner with Melbourne. They were 2,401 members’ votes away from extinction. All this a mere 5 years after their extraordinary run of 5 flags from 8 Grand Final appearances in 9 seasons (1983-1991).

Now apart from this email, when have these calamities ever been mentioned by anyone, let alone pushed by Collingwood or Hawthorn themselves every time it’s contemporarily convenient to make excuses for a poor season, or an upset September defeat, or any time the current coach is on the hotseat?

But at Port, our nadir is all we ever hear about, often free of context and with varying degrees of factual accuracy:

• “I guess you forget when Ken arrived!”
• “There were tarps on the seats!”
• “There was talk the club would be wound up!”
• “The club was broken!”
• “Nobody wanted to coach us!”
• “Everybody wanted to leave!”

Read this next bit back a good 3 or 4 times so it sinks in: Who cares?! It was 13+ years ago!

Revisionist, defeatist, failure-apologia such as this is a self-fulfilling millstone around the club’s neck, and anathema to a proud, confident, culture of winning and genuine success. And for emphasis: finishing top-2 and earning a home Prelim in back-to-back years only to miss the Grand Final twice (2020/21), is anything but.

Talk of ‘punching above our weight (you)’ and being a ‘little battler club from Alberton (Koch)’ is cut from the same cloth.

Cosplay as a minnow — we most certainly are not and never have been in what is a salary-capped league predicated on a draft — and you’ll perform like one.

Port people want to be inspired and dream big. Not be constantly marinated in misery, embarrassment and excuses while being relentlessly gaslighted with nonsense purporting that the Ken Hinkley Era was a wonderful decade or so to look back on with great fondness and pride actually, and that near enough is good enough.

“We never gave up”? The most recent Showdown and the string of disastrous home finals over the years begs to differ.

Ultimately, Port people have long memories, aren’t stupid, and are tired of being patronised and treated as such. Thus,

• Instil some pride in who we existentially are. Not what we are now relative to how bad things may or may not have been when today’s high school graduates were in kindergarten.

• Set some realistic goals (not hollow ones that only serve to embarrass us like ‘Chasing Greatness’ does). Actual consequences for failure. Don’t move the goalposts post-hoc with rationale such as ‘well nobody expected us to finish top-4!’ after blowing a home final by a record margin as Koch has done in the past.

• Draw some actual red lines. Actual consequences for transgression.

• Stop lionising mediocrity and gaslighting failure.

• Be honest. eg. Maybe don’t be afraid of admitting that getting smashed in a home Prelim against a squad of hotel detainees was unacceptable and a shameful disgrace instead of patting players on the head, pretending it was all a bit of bad luck, and just hoping that things will be different next time.

• If a certain player or coach bristles at hearing some home truths, they can always see if St. Kilda’s or South Adelaide’s hiring, etc.

• Oh, and this might seem pedantically churlish, but if you bring in a recruit as a salary dump, who previously antagonised Port fans while playing for the Crows in a Showdown, and he only plays 2 games for us in less than 12 months — they probably don’t need 3 days of retirement posts across the club’s myriad social media pages.

We are Port Adelaide. For the love of god, Start acting like it.

Regards,

Tribiscus O’Malley III
(Platinum Member # xxxxxxx)
Click to expand...
That might be the best post I've ever read on BigFooty...
 
Sheeds said:
Yeah, I doubt you will get a response. As a Club Employee so eloquently told me "It is easy to be critical and to say we haven't been successful if you choose to just focus on Premierships and winning finals" I didn't really know how to respond to that statement.
Click to expand...
Is it possible the club internally have deluded themselves into thinking they’re a community organisation that just happens to play a bit of footy as well?

Like seriously how else can you interpret that statement from the club employee.

Genuinely angry reading that.
 
Sheeds said:
Yeah, I doubt you will get a response. As a Club Employee so eloquently told me "It is easy to be critical and to say we haven't been successful if you choose to just focus on Premierships and winning finals" I didn't really know how to respond to that statement.
Click to expand...

That is some Washington Generals level of systematic loser talk.

Employee should be tarred, feathered and paraded down Commercial Rd.
 

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tribey said:
welp, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t received any form of reply, so I’m going to assume he either instabinned it or it was automatically filtered out,

so this is what I sent to his club email address after receiving that binjuice ‘from the CEO’ mail of September 5:

View attachment 2423098

Matthew,

I’m going to cut to the chase. This part of your recent missive was nauseating.

I’m roundly sick and tired of hearing Mandela Effect-tier nonsense about how bad things supposedly were in 2012 (we didn’t even finish bottom-four!), particularly when shamelessly utilised as a ready crutch to lean on in the event of failures in the present. Time and again. Year after year. And I’m telling you, I’m not the only one.

As if Ken Hinkley didn’t walk into the plum situation of a freshly cashed-up football department and an exciting young playing list brimming with potential just begging to be unlocked.

As if Adelaide Oval wasn’t already greenlit and instead, its agreed redevelopment and associated restructure of South Australian football governance somehow hinged on Port winning 13 games out of 24 in 2013.

All told, a tantalising situation a world away from that endured by his predecessor, Matthew Primus. Who would’ve killed to have Alan Richardson and Darren Burgess at his left and right hand on day one, to help develop the likes of Boak, Gray, Wingard, Jonas and Hartlett and others, but the funds within the AFL’s previously agreed rescue package were denied to him.

We are a football club with a 155-year history of being one of the national game’s foremost institutions, renowned for the ruthless pursuit of excellence that not only resulted in 34 senior premierships and 4 national titles at SANFL level from 1877-1996, but saw us hit the ground running at AFL level — winning more games than any other club in our first eleven years in the national competition, and securing our one and only flag at the highest level.

Why then, is there such an urge to hyperfocus and fixate on the relative blip of 2010-12? As if Port were the only club to ever endure a temporary nadir on and off-field? Hear me out:

• As the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2000, Collingwood were millions of dollars in debt and the reigning wooden spooners. What’s more, just hours earlier a young Brendan Fevola had booted 12 goals for Carlton en route to a 88pt smashing of the Pies in the so-called ‘Millennium Match’.

• In 1996, the destitute Hawks almost merged as subordinate partner with Melbourne. They were 2,401 members’ votes away from extinction. All this a mere 5 years after their extraordinary run of 5 flags from 8 Grand Final appearances in 9 seasons (1983-1991).

Now apart from this email, when have these calamities ever been mentioned by anyone, let alone pushed by Collingwood or Hawthorn themselves every time it’s contemporarily convenient to make excuses for a poor season, or an upset September defeat, or any time the current coach is on the hotseat?

But at Port, our nadir is all we ever hear about, often free of context and with varying degrees of factual accuracy:

• “I guess you forget when Ken arrived!”
• “There were tarps on the seats!”
• “There was talk the club would be wound up!”
• “The club was broken!”
• “Nobody wanted to coach us!”
• “Everybody wanted to leave!”

Read this next bit back a good 3 or 4 times so it sinks in: Who cares?! It was 13+ years ago!

Revisionist, defeatist, failure-apologia such as this is a self-fulfilling millstone around the club’s neck, and anathema to a proud, confident, culture of winning and genuine success. And for emphasis: finishing top-2 and earning a home Prelim in back-to-back years only to miss the Grand Final twice (2020/21), is anything but.

Talk of ‘punching above our weight (you)’ and being a ‘little battler club from Alberton (Koch)’ is cut from the same cloth.

Cosplay as a minnow — we most certainly are not and never have been in what is a salary-capped league predicated on a draft — and you’ll perform like one.

Port people want to be inspired and dream big. Not be constantly marinated in misery, embarrassment and excuses while being relentlessly gaslighted with nonsense purporting that the Ken Hinkley Era was a wonderful decade or so to look back on with great fondness and pride actually, and that near enough is good enough.

“We never gave up”? The most recent Showdown and the string of disastrous home finals over the years begs to differ.

Ultimately, Port people have long memories, aren’t stupid, and are tired of being patronised and treated as such. Thus,

• Instil some pride in who we existentially are. Not what we are now relative to how bad things may or may not have been when today’s high school graduates were in kindergarten.

• Set some realistic goals (not hollow ones that only serve to embarrass us like ‘Chasing Greatness’ does). Actual consequences for failure. Don’t move the goalposts post-hoc with rationale such as ‘well nobody expected us to finish top-4!’ after blowing a home final by a record margin as Koch has done in the past.

• Draw some actual red lines. Actual consequences for transgression.

• Stop lionising mediocrity and gaslighting failure.

• Be honest. eg. Maybe don’t be afraid of admitting that getting smashed in a home Prelim against a squad of hotel detainees was unacceptable and a shameful disgrace instead of patting players on the head, pretending it was all a bit of bad luck, and just hoping that things will be different next time.

• If a certain player or coach bristles at hearing some home truths, they can always see if St. Kilda’s or South Adelaide’s hiring, etc.

• Oh, and this might seem pedantically churlish, but if you bring in a recruit as a salary dump, who previously antagonised Port fans while playing for the Crows in a Showdown, and he only plays 2 games for us in less than 12 months — they probably don’t need 3 days of retirement posts across the club’s myriad social media pages.

We are Port Adelaide. For the love of god, Start acting like it.

Regards,

Tribiscus O’Malley III
(Platinum Member # xxxxxxx)
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