Cash crisis affecting Port players

Posted June 3, 2011 14:47:00

Port Adelaide players are worried about the AFL club's cash crisis but money cannot buy happiness at the debt-ridden entity, coach Matthew Primus says.

The AFL will soon detail a multi-million dollar rescue package to ensure the Power survive for the next three years.

Port's licence holder, the SANFL, this week said it could no longer afford to keep bailing out the club.

The AFL will insist most of rescue package funds flow to Port's football department, which is running at league-low levels about $6 million less than Collingwood.

The financial crisis sparked fears Port - second-last on the ladder with only two wins - could lose out-of-contract players such as Jackson Trengove and Alipate Carlile to cashed-up rivals.

But while conceding money spoke, Primus was not fazed at opposition clubs circling his stars.

"I'm not really concerned about it. What I'm concerned about is building a club here that has a great culture," Primus said.

"In the end, even though the circumstances of what is happening in AFL footy is changing with free agency and those sorts of things, I think still the camaraderie and the bond your playing group has is the biggest thing to keep your players at the club.

"And that is what we are working towards. If you're really strong in that regard, you give yourself the best opportunity of keeping your players."

Primus said Port players understood the predicament of their club, saying "I'm sure individually they are worried.

"Things could be better, no doubt about that," he said.

"But we understand where we are going and the support we have from the AFL and the SANFL.

"They (players) understand the predicament our club is in and they have an onus on them, to some degree, to play some very good football and to engage as well as we can with our fans and our sponsors."

Primus said Port and other clubs would face additional obstacles when the AFL introduced free agency at the end of next season.

"But we're very confident that we can battle through that," he said.

"And if our playing group are as tight as they are at the moment, considering what they have been through the last couple of months, we think that will hold us in pretty good stead.

"And in the end, that is the biggest thing in football.

"Money does speak, we're aware of that.

"But what speaks more than that is a love for the club and your love for playing with your mates.

"I think that is the biggest thing we can hang onto, and what I really see is this playing group have got it in spades."

-AAP

Tags: sport, australian-football-league, sa, port-adelaide-5015

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Power cut off: financial crisis point

Port Adelaide Football Club's financial problems have gone from bad to worse after the SANFL withdrew support and credit lines to help the debt-riddled club. Moves may be made for the SANFL to take over Power.

SANFL appointed Power board member John Irving tendered his resignation, with pressures placed for club president Brett Duncanson and chief executive officer Mark Haysman to do the same.

Talking to 891 Breakfast, The Advertiser chief football writer Michelangelo Rucci said the SANFL keeping the AFL club licence in the state was essential to the success of the Adelaide Oval redevelopment.

"Does the AFL then start writing cheques?

"And then if they're writing the cheques, they would inevitably demand that their people be running the footy club."

He told Matthew Abraham and David Bevan that he believed it would be unlikely that the current administration would continue tenure.

Falling home-ground crowd attendances have not helped the financial plight of the Port Adelaide Football Club, with the club still failing to produce profits.

"The reality is you have to get people to your games and you also have to have a stadium deal that allows you to profit from those people at the game.

"It is a continuation of what is a major issue on the governance of SA footy, when the Adelaide Football Club couldn't make a profit last year and will not make a profit this year, something is not adding up is it?"

891 Grandstand AFL commentator and former development coach for Port Adelaide Stephen Williams said the club may need to renegotiate its deal with SANFL to get to the larger Adelaide Oval grounds sooner.

"The club certainly is in a bad way.

"The people that are running Port Adelaide have a plan in place, and Port Adelaide people have to have the confidence that these guys know what they are doing."

Meetings will be held today to decide the financial future of the club and its current leadership group.

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