Eddie’s locked in to opposing Power’s prison bar push
COLLINGWOOD president Eddie McGuire says Port Adelaide’s bid to wear its iconic prison bars guernsey in Showdowns remains “out of the question”, as support ramps up for the push.
Port Adelaide’s online petition to wear the top in future Showdowns has ticked over the 34,000 mark.
The public response will form part of a formal submission to the AFL expected to be submitted in the coming weeks, with Port Adelaide’s executive general manager Matthew Richardson saying the club would wait for the right time to present to the league.
“We will do it in the right way and we think we have a really strong case, the heritage of Showdowns and the significance of that guernsey,” he said.
McGuire has been a fierce critic of the Power’s push to don the prison bars in future Showdowns, threatening legal action against Port for what he says would be a breach of copyright.
When it was mentioned by former Port Adelaide player Dwayne Russell on radio on
Wednesday that he hadn’t asked him about the prison bars debate in their interview, McGuire said he didn’t need to “worry about a question” and that the Power should just enjoy the run of good form of late it was experiencing.
“It’s out of the question don’t worry about that,” McGuire said on SEN. “Just wear the one you are wearing – it’s fantastic, enjoy it, you are playing well you are on top of the ladder.”
Port Adelaide won approval from the AFL and Collingwood in 2007 to wear the prison bars in all Heritage Rounds thereafter. But there hasn’t been a Heritage Round since and the Power is asking the AFL to honour that agreement, arguing that Showdowns are about South Australia’s football’s heritage.