Rucci's Rip: Primus lost in sea of change

Written By Unknown on Minggu, 31 Maret 2013 | 22.09

IT is doubtful too many at noon yesterday - as the Port Adelaide Football Club started its new era on the MCG - would have spared a thought for former Power coach Matthew Primus.

Nor former president Brett Duncanson. Nor former board members such as David Basheer or Alex Panas, whose tireless work in squeezing money out of a rock in a Crows-dominated business world was never widely appreciated.

Time has moved on at Alberton this summer.

But that is the way of this cut-throat professional AFL game. It brings in people, consumes them and leaves others to live in the glory of their unrecognised work.

Ian Dicker saved Hawthorn as club president from 1997-2005 - Jeff Kennett scored the glory with the 2008 AFL premiership.

New Port Adelaide president David Koch has filled the Power with new hope, new energy and new promise.

But he also does not forget those who went before him - and acknowledges men such as Duncanson are unfairly tainted by the nightmares that overcame Alberton in the past three years.

Duncanson picked up a club working off a failed business model, rolled up his sleeves to do the "heavy lifting" to put his club in a modern stadium in the city and led a board that set up much of the discussion papers that took Port's thinking out of the Alberton postcode to set up advisory boards in Sydney and Melbourne ... and a club president in Sydney.

How Matthew Primus - now at Gold Coast as an assistant coach - watched yesterday's dominant display by Port makes for a fascinating debate. Picture: Colleen Petch

Unfortunately, Duncanson and his board did not have the money to underwrite their decision to appoint Primus as coach after the earlier faux pas with Mark Williams.

How Primus - now at Gold Coast as an assistant coach - watched yesterday's match makes for a fascinating debate.

Did he think how much his task as Power coach would have been easier had he been given a squad prepared by fitness guru Darren Burgess? A long-established AFL coach says Burgess' work alone will improve the Power by 10-15 per cent this season.

How would have Primus' three seasons as Port coach unfolded differently had he worked in a football department with an experienced coaching director as Alan Richardson?

These are Ken Hinkley's blessings at Alberton today.

The Port Adelaide Football Club made some howlers before this summer of change. There is no denying this. But so did Hawthorn before Dicker's regime finally overcame the problems of the mid-1990s to set up a premiership window for Kennett and Alastair Clarkson.

If Koch and his team do the same for Hinkley, there should be a moment to remember Primus, Duncanson, Panas and Basheer. Their commitment and sacrifices seem to have been lost amid the wind of change.

RIP IT UP
1. BOB KATTER

THE "Mad Hatter" of Australian federal politics is planning to take in his manifesto for September's national election a tax break for the AFL's millionaire players.

He argues they deserve a leaner hit on their pockets because they will not be earning big money once they are turfed out of the game.

Katter may find those who are earning no money today and suffering with social services - in particular at hospitals - being deprived tax-based funding look elsewhere on the voting slip on September 14.

2. ALIPATE CARLILE
AS much as the Port Adelaide key defender says he has changed - and he has made that vow quite often - there might be a very strong argument that it was best for the Power to keep Carlile on edge at Alberton.

Instead, Port has handed the 25-year-old a four-year contract extension that is an extreme vote of confidence in a player who can hardly afford to luxuriate in a comfort zone.

3. ANDREW DEMETRIOU
HOW did the AFL boss keep a straight face while telling the guests at the Gold Coast Football Club season launch last week that his league had made a mistake in leaving northern markets to the AFL's rugby rivals in March?

Demetriou could have activated the Suns' Metricon Stadium for the NAB Cup final between Brisbane and Carlton had the AFL wanted to make its presence felt north of the Murray against the opening of the NRL season.

4. SANFL CLUBS
HOW can the SANFL clubs cry poverty while one after the other is put before the SA Football Commission for salary cap cheating?

Too many SANFL clubs live in very fragile glasshouses when they attack the Port Adelaide Football Club for fiscal mismanagement.

And how much of the SANFL game development program is compromised by this salary cap rorting?

5. FOOTY CLASSIFIED
FROM the moment Channel Nine's Footy Classified joined the long list of football panel shows in 2007 it defined its way of business by being feisty and opinionated. Considering its 10.30pm start on Monday nights, it could hardly afford to be mundane or tame.

But in recent weeks the resident stirrer, Craig Hutchison, has made the attacks on his co-panelists as genuine as the bruising and battering of World Championship Wrestling in the late 1960s when Mario Milano and Killer Karl Kox were ratings winners for Nine on Sunday afternoons.

RIPPER OF THE WEEK
ALL praise to the men at Toyota - in particular former Crows and Power board member Robert Hoey - for taking no issue with Renault sponsoring the Port Adelaide Football Club in the Toyota-badged AFL.

Hoey went as far as to redirect his Northpoint Toyota sponsorship at Alberton so as not to put a spanner in the three-year deal with Renault.

Can anyone imagine AFL sponsors Coca-Cola or CUB being so sporting?


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