ONE HAD no choice but to admire Warren Tredrea's passion for the
once-proud club he represented on 255 occasions.
He wants only the best for Port Adelaide, always has. He always gave it the best he had in a courageous and impactful 14-year career.
Tredrea, yet again shattered this week by Port somehow falling to yet
another fresh low-point, is now calling for the Power to chase Mick
Malthouse and Paul Roos for the again-vacant coaching position.
Hate to dampen the bright thoughts of anyone associated with the club, but there is more chance of that little NASA contraption now roaming Mars bumping into a lost and living human being than of Malthouse or Roos agreeing to coach Port Adelaide.
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Port chief executive Keith Thomas needs to realise this before he even picks up the phone to ring either man.
Neither tolerates a fool, which, unfortunately, is what Port Adelaide has become.
Far wealthier, far more attractive, far more sound football clubs have sounded out Roos since he made it known he would leave the Sydney Swans at the end of the 2010 season. And they haven't even got near entering his psyche.
And Malthouse will be coaching Carlton, or continuing his 2012 media arrangements.
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Tredrea gave reason to all non-Port Adelaide supporters to hate Port Adelaide. And in footy, opposition hatred is the most wonderful of commodities.
He played hard. He taunted opponents. He riled opposition spectators. He put his body on the line in every contest, and he was successful.
He was totally Port Adelaide, when that actually meant something.
Now, no one hates Port. No outsider has reason to even think about it these days. Unless Greater Western Sydney defeats it in 2012. Or Gold Coast in 2011. Unless a coach is sacked. Or a president breaks down at a press conference. Unless a star player is being wooed by other clubs.
Port Adelaide has wasted so much time, money and pride in recent years that to even dream about securing Malthouse or Roos would be to waste even more resources than it already disgracefully has since it made the wimpish decision to re-contract Mark Williams as coach at the end of 2009.
That fresh arrangement, for two more seasons and which went against the better thinking of many key officials, lasted a whole 15 matches and required a payout of an amount not far short of seven figures.
Matthew Primus filled in for the final seven matches of 2010. He has departed after just 47 matches, after last Saturday's horrific loss to GWS.
The AFL is worried about Port Adelaide. It has sent the club about $9 million of subsidies. It is concerned on a weekly basis by the crowds - for all Port matches, not just AAMI Stadium games - the club attracts.
It noted with interest how, even on the day Primus was to depart, that more damage was done to image when president Brett Duncanson somehow made it all about himself in announcing he too would be leaving.
Port has become a bleak place, mostly of its own doing and poor decision-making.
It simply cannot afford to get wrong its next coaching appointment. Yet unfortunately it also can't afford - and won't in anyway at all appeal attractive to - either of the the two men Tredrea believes would be key to the future.
Maybe the seven "independent experts" Thomas has employed to review the club will produce a whizz-bang plan.
Follow Damian Barrett on Twitter at @barrettdamian
