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Port Adelaide continued their impressive end-of-season form on Saturday night, defeating the Gold Coast Suns by six goals away from home.
>>MATCH REPORT: Port down Suns by six goals
Gold Coast 7.9.51 def by Port Adelaide 12.16.88
The Gold Coast Suns and Port Adelaide Power have both failed badly to meet expectations in 2015, but have an opportunity to finish the season off on a high. Join The Roar for live scores and commentary from 7:20pm (AEST).
Hotly tipped to make their debut finals appearance in 2015, the Suns have instead found themselves in the thick of the race for the wooden spoon.
But as miserable a season as it’s been for the expansion side, last week was memorable for the right reasons after they won a heart-stopper against Essendon, giving them two wins and a draw from their last four games.
With an injury list of biblical proportions, 2015 has seen the Suns get a lot of game time into some of their rawest talents, and they’ll be looking to make a real go of it in their final two matches of the year.
Gold Coast famously enjoyed their first ever win against Port Adelaide back in 2011, but they’ve lost all four encounters between the two sides since, including all three home games.
Port Adelaide gave their fans a bittersweet victory last week, comprehensively outperforming Hawthorn in a confidence-restoring, but ultimately frustrating late-season victory.
The Power have matched it with some of the best teams this season, defeating Hawthorn twice, while also putting in gallant efforts away from home against Fremantle and Sydney.
But they’ve also mixed those efforts in with some bafflingly poor ones, most notably a heavy loss to the Lions in Brisbane and an inexplicable four-point loss to Carlton with their season on the line. A win over the Suns at Metricon is no guarantee.
Port have failed to live up to the hype in a big way this season, but they can start preparing for 2016 now with a strong finish to the season.
Gold Coast enjoyed a rare win last week, and even rarer still got through the match without adding to their injury list. That said, Rodney Eade hasn’t been shy of making changes regardless of results this season.
Charlie Dixon is a near certainty to return from his troublesome ankle injury, while Andrew Raines, Andrew Boston and Daniel Gorringe were all dominant for the reserves in an 85-point steam-rolling of Eastlake.
Port Adelaide would be unlikely to make too many changes to a side that convincingly defeated the reigning back-to-back premiers away from home.
Should Ken Hinkley turn to the SANFL, he’d be looking at Paul Stewart, Sam Colquhoun and Andrew Moore, who were all listed in the Port Adelaide Magpies best last week.
Prediction
As inconsistent as Port Adelaide have been this season, they look to have finally hit their stride – albeit far too late for them to deliver on this season’s expectations.
Gold Coast may have enjoyed a thrilling victory last week, but with the Power coming off an inspiring victory over a full-strength Hawthorn, look for them to continue their late season surge.
Power by 35 points.