This is Kochie’s greatest hit

Port Adelaide has stunned Geelong with a 40 point win to go top of the AFL ladder.

Port Adelaide fans love him. Except for the guy at the back, it seems. PIC SARAH REED. Source: News Limited

THEY'RE the story of the AFL season so far. Port Adelaide. A team nobody outside Adelaide thinks about, let alone talks about.

This is a team with teal, black and white colours — and let's be honest, does any self-respecting man even know what teal is? A team with a gawky mascot called Tommy "Thunda" Power and a cringe-worthy song with the line: "we'll never stop, stop, stop till we're top, top, top".

Well, guess what. Port Adelaide now sits on "top, top, top" of the AFL ladder, after beating its nemesis Geelong by 40 points yesterday. Geelong, remember, trounced Port in a 2007 grand final so one-sided, your TV monitor probably tipped sideways on the wall.

Port still hadn't beaten the Cats since that day. But now they have, in the clearest sign yet that this club is going places.

Head and shoulders above the rest: Port's Robbie Gray marks in front of Geelong's Cameron Guthrie. Photo: Sarah Reed. Source: News Corp Australia

PROMISING SIGNS

The signs have been good for a while. No nonsense Port coach Ken Hinkley was last year voted coach of the year by his peers. Captain Travis Boak is increasingly well-regarded. The club even has a secret weapon in fitness guru Darren Burgess, who has turned them into fourth-quarter powerhouses. No team more regularly reverses three-quarter time deficits than Port Adelaide.

But underpinning all the success is Port Adelaide Chairman David Koch. Yes, Kochie. You might remember him from such successful breakfast TV shows as Channel Seven's Sunrise.

Since becoming chairman of the club he'd supported since childhood in late 2012, Koch has made an unpopular club popular again. Broadcaster and commentator Gerard Whateley was at the footy in Adelaide yesterday watching Koch work his magic.

"He's a very popular and recognisable figure, "Whateley says. "Wherever you go, fans call out to him. He's given people a great sense of belonging. They call out to get photos with him, and he's extremely accommodating.

"They're his people now and to see him with parents afterwards, he's clearly got a great link with the mums and dads of the players. He's making the club a family where everyone's welcome."

Man of the people. Except perhaps the guy at the back.Photo: Sarah Reed. Source: News Limited

A PORT BOY

Koch grew up wearing a Port Adelaide guernsey around the beachside Adelaide suburb of Largs North. Back then, Port were the called Magpies and played in the South Australian competition, the SANFL. They still do. But in 1997, the club also joined the AFL, competing as the Power.

The early days were tough. In a portent of the 2012 season when the Sydney Swans won the flag while their new cross-town rivals GWS floundered, the Power missed the finals and watched the Adelaide Crows win the flag. The same occurred for good measure in 1998.

But by 2004, the Power had officially arrived, ending the Brisbane Lions dynasty in emphatic fashion. Port Adelaide were premiers, as Adelaide Crows fans cried tears of sauvignon blanc.

The 2007 season, on paper at least, was another good year. Plenty of teams would be thrilled with making a grand final. But the scale of Port's loss to Geelong was so great, and above all so embarrassing, the wounds took years to heal. By 2012, Port Adelaide's front door had become a turnstile for captains and coaches. Enter David Koch.

"Here was a club on the brink, with people questioning its relevance and whether it should remain there," Koch tells news.com.au.

"It was a club that had got itself a bit bogged down in the bunker, it was too inward looking and was really more concerned with its own postcode than understanding we play in a national competition on field and off the field.

"We had to build a club that was respected not only by our heartland and traditional members but also on a national basis, and build a brand, a club that even if you didn't barrack for Port, you'd say 'Geez, I love watching this club play'.

"Right from start we said we wanted to bring fun into footy. Life is so grumpy and serious these days. We wanted a team that played entertaining footy and when you come now, it's just a good family fun night out.

"The key was to have simple foundations. Good people, good culture, good processes, that's what we wanted."

Everyone wants a piece of Travis Boak and Dom Cassisi these days. Photo: Sarah Reed. Source: News Corp Australia

STRONG LEADERSHIP

For all his input, Koch is at pains not to take too much credit for the turnaround.

"I feel a bit guilty because a lot of people have worked over the years to get where we are now, from recruitment guys who put together a young team of real goers through to the previous board who did all the negotiations to get the club moved to Adelaide Oval. More importantly there's Ken Hinkley [the first Port Adelaide coach in 50 years with no previous connection to the club] and his coaching staff and Travis Boak, who will be one of our great captains."

Kochie says he now has the right board, chief executive, coach and captain. Yet he's not getting ahead of himself despite a bumper crowd of 47,000 turning up this weekend at the revamped Adelaide Oval. (For the record, Port is attracting bigger average crowds than the Crows in season 2014. That didn't even happen in the premiership year of 2004).

Kochie knows that it's just round six: "We're delighted with where we are, but then last year we won our first five matches, then lost the next five. You can never pick the future in footy."

But Whateley doesn't see the Power collapsing from here.

"They play genuine footy, hard unflinching footy. And they run. They've got a real dare but they have a built-in discipline too. Their game has solid foundations. They have the third youngest list but they have experience too. Their time might come quicker than people think. I think the competition this year will break into three groups and they'll definitely be in the breakaway at the top."

As much as Whateley admires the new Power on the field, he has even greater admiration for what's happened off the field.

"This was a club that had no spark to them at all. It was nearly a carcass on the football landscape three or four years ago. Koch brought a dynamism, a real palpable excitement. He made them stand for something."

Captain and coach share a joke about why all medals in the AFL are so ridiculously small. Photo: Sarah Reed. Source: News Corp Australia

THE PEOPLE'S CLUB

And what the club stands for, above all, is community. Just ask Kochie.

"Our roots go back to 1870. We're a community club, not a franchise. It's in our DNA. Our players get involved in so many community programs, we're really proud of those community links, it builds a soul, a heart into the club, and that's one of the keys to our success."

Under Koch, the Power's membership has skyrocketed from 28,000 to 41,000 last year, then a record 52,000 (and counting) this year. Despite that, the bottom line is still not assured.

"We're a challenger brand in a small market. We've got to be a bunch of goers, got to be best practise from football to off-field. It's been a terrific response by our members but overall, we've still got a lot to do."

In other words, the bottom line is still shaky. And Koch, remember, is a finance man through and through.

"In the business of sport, corporates are a lagging indicator. Merchandise sales and membership are leading indicators. The corporates wait for those till they move. So we've still got to tap into that and get the big corporate dollars. But it's coming."

A premiership might be coming too. But for now, the throngs at the Adelaide Oval are just happy to be on top, top, top. And with one of Australia's cleverest and most popular men helping run the show, who's to say when they'll stop, stop, stop?

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