The 1994

South Australian National Football League The South Australian National Football League, or SANFL ( or ''S-A-N-F-L''), is an Australian rules football league based in the Australian state of South Australia. It is also the state's governing body for the sport. Originally formed as the ...

(SANFL)

Grand Final Primarily in Australian sports, a grand final (sometimes colloquially abbreviated to "grannie") is a game that decides a sports league's premiership (or championship) winning team, i.e. the conclusive game of a finals (or play-off) series. Sy ...

saw the

Port Adelaide Magpies Adelaide Football Club is a professional Australian rules football club based in Alberton, South Australia. The club's senior men's team plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), where they are nicknamed the Power, whilst its reserves ...

defeat the

Woodville-West Torrens Eagles Woodville-West Torrens Football Club is an Australian rules football club playing in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL). It was formed in 1990 from an amalgamation of the neighbouring Woodville and West Torrens football clu ...

by 37 points after being 35 points behind in the first quarter. The match was played on 2 October 1994 at

Football Park Football Park, known commercially as AAMI Stadium, was an Australian rules football stadium located in West Lakes, South Australia, West Lakes, a western suburb of Adelaide, the state capital of South Australia, Australia. It was built in 197 ...

in front of a crowd of 40,598.

Background

Despite

Port Adelaide Port Adelaide is a port-side region of Adelaide, approximately northwest of the Adelaide CBD. It is also the namesake of the City of Port Adelaide Enfield council, a suburb, a federal and state electoral division and is the main port for the ...

's recent success, having won 4 premierships in the 6 years leading up to 1994, the

Eagles Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just ...

were seen as the superior team coming into the Grand Final. Port had lost several key players in recent years to the

AFL AFL may refer to: Sports * American Football League (AFL), a name shared by several separate and unrelated professional American football leagues: ** American Football League (1926) (a.k.a. "AFL I"), first rival of the National Football Leagu ...

and retirement, and the Eagles had thrashed Port just 2 weeks earlier in the 2nd Semi Final by 73 points. Betting before the Grand Final saw

Woodville-West Torrens Woodville-West Torrens Football Club is an Australian rules football club playing in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL). It was formed in 1990 from an amalgamation of the neighbouring Woodville and West Torrens football clu ...

as clear favourites with 1/3 odds and

Port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ham ...

at 25/10.1994 Grand Final Port Adelaide v Eagles 2/10/94, video cassette,

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

Sport Port's odds could have been even higher if not for their outstanding record in Grand Finals, and their reputation for beating better teams.

Match Summary

At the 25-minute mark of the first quarter, the Eagles led by 35 points and seemed to be headed towards certain victory. Port kicked the last 2 goals in the quarter to leave the Eagles with a 22-point lead. The second quarter was evenly matched with both teams scoring 2.3, however the Eagles still seemed to have the game under control. Port Adelaide fought back in the third quarter and outplayed the Eagles, but Port failed to capitalise due to inaccurate kicking for goal, scoring 2.6 (18) to 1.2 (8) for the quarter and still trailing by 12 points. Port went into the final quarter with momentum and ran over the top of the Eagles. Port kicked 3 goals in the first 7 minutes to take the lead, and kicked 9.3 (57) to 1.2 (8) for the quarter to run out winners with a margin of 37 points. Full-forward

Scott Hodges Scott may refer to: Places Canada * Scott, Quebec, municipality in the Nouvelle-Beauce regional municipality in Quebec * Scott, Saskatchewan, a town in the Rural Municipality of Tramping Lake No. 380 * Rural Municipality of Scott No. 98, Saskat ...

kicked 5 goals for the quarter. What is seldom reported is that a strong northerly breeze swung around after 3/4 time, becoming a strong south westerly change . This meant that Port Adelaide had the benefit of a 4 goal breeze for 3 quarters compared to woodville West Torrens' 1 quarter.

Teams

Port Adelaide was captained by

Tim Ginever Timothy Ginever (born 13 April 1966) is a former Australian rules footballer in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL), playing for Port Adelaide. Early life Tim Ginever is the seventh of 10 children and says that Australian ...

and coached by John Cahill. Woodville-West Torrens was captained by Peter Schwarz and coached by Bruce Winter.SANFL Premiership Teams

Scorecard

Jack Oatey Medal

The

Jack Oatey Medal The Jack Oatey Medal is awarded to the best player during the SANFL Grand Final. It has been awarded since 1981. In 2018, Mitch Grigg of Norwood became the first player to win the Jack Oatey Medal on a losing team, after his team were defeated b ...

for best player in the Grand Final was awarded to

Darryl Wakelin Darryl Wakelin (born 11 August 1974) is a former Australian rules footballer who played for St Kilda and Port Adelaide in the Australian Football League as a defender. AFL career Adelaide Wakelin was selected by Adelaide with the 11th pic ...

of Port Adelaide.

External links

Port Adelaide Football Club Official Website

Eagles Official Website

SANFL Official Website

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:1994 Sanfl Grand Final SANFL Grand Finals Sanfl Grand Final, 1994