PORT Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley expects forward Willie Rioli to return to action next weekend after a one-game absence for threatening rival players.

Rioli missed Port's five-point loss to bitter foes Adelaide in another Showdown thriller on Saturday night.

Hinkley mused after Adelaide's 13.10 (89) to 12.12 (84) victory that Rioli "might have been handy tonight".

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"He'll be fine," Hinkley said.

"We'll look after him, we'll make some decisions and make sure he's okay.

"Our major focus is to make sure Willie is okay and he has got our care and he always will have."

Rioli opted not to attend Adelaide Oval on Saturday night.

"He had the choice ... I thought the right option for him was not to be here," Hinkley said.

"He just needed some time and I made sure he got that time.

"And we will move on and hopefully we can leave all this stuff behind us and we can get on with playing footy."

The Power, with four wins and five losses, are in 13th spot and in a logjam of clubs one win outside the top eight.

"We have had moments, quarters, halves, that we have been pretty damaging," Hinkley said of the season.

"Most teams, I think, would give us a lot of respect when they come up against us because we're capable.

"But unless you consistently do it ... you're not going to go on any run."

Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks says his Crows are "exactly" where they want to be in fifth spot with six wins and three losses.

"We're exactly where we'd like to be performance-wise, not necessarily win-loss," Nicks said.

"We've talked about what sort of performance we want as a ground level of what we expect.

"Our bad performances this year have been a three-goal loss to Freo over in Perth, we lost to Geelong (by 19 points).

"So we're in a position where, even when we haven't got the outcome we're after, we still come away with a lot of positives.

"Tonight wasn't our best performance by any means but we come away with a win.

"So really pleased about where we're at - the win-loss looks after itself."

Nicks hailed the gritty nature of Saturday night's win which gives the Crows a 29-28 edge over Port in the overall head-to-head record.

"It was a great win ... we had a lot of guys who weren't at their best," he said.

But not among that company was Riley Thilthorpe, whose 62nd AFL game was among his most influential.

Pitted against renowned aerialist Aliir Aliir, the big Crow collected 10 marks, half of them contested, booted three goals and also had three score assists.

"Riley, he really looks forward to these big games - and they are big for him," Nicks said.

"It was talked about a lot in his early part of his career, people were sort of challenging him around what he needed to be better at.

"So he went to work and now he just loves it, he embraces the big contest.

"He had some really tough match-ups and he wanted to show where his improvements have come.

"I thought he did that, especially in the first half."