WHILE Port Adelaide's midfield stars fired against Melbourne on Sunday, it was performances at the two ends of the ground that put a smile on Ken Hinkley's face post-match.
Mitch Georgiades took 10 marks and kicked a career-high seven goals in a dominant display up forward, while Esava Ratugolea also hit a career best with 13 marks as he continually repelled the Demons' attacking forays.
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Hinkley saw the strong key position performances for what they were – "A different way to win.
"Mitch has kicked 7.4 and might not have been best-on-ground," Hinkley said.
"It's not typically we talk about bookends of the ground, a full-forward and a full-back, being as dominant as they were, we've typically survived around the midfield group."
"It was really pleasing for Esava particularly to play that way – he's played a really strong year, he's been a really important player for us this year. You can see him growing with confidence.
"And then Mitchell, to do what he did on a high-quality opponent and score the goals that he scored - that's a big number in AFL footy, seven. You know 7.4 is a really big number now.
"As I said, it's a different way for us to win when we're strong at both ends of the ground."
It has generally been the case that the Power's engine room gets the attention, and once again Zak Butters, Jason Horne-Francis and Connor Rozee were impressive, but Georgiades' improvement in particular could prove crucial in the future.
"We'd like to think our game is continuing to develop," Hinkley said.
"It needed a reset and we've managed to, so far, start off the back half of the year in a better position."
Simon Goodwin also talked about a reset, but it's one that's meeting with some resistance.
The Demons sit in 15th spot with five wins and nine losses, their season on life support as finals become little more than a mathematical possibility.
"We have changed a lot in the last 12 months, we certainly took stock at the end of last year," Goodwin said after the match.
"We've made some progression in the last eight to nine weeks after a really slow start to the season, but we've never looked at outcome as where we want to be as a footy club, we want to look at our process, make sure we keep building.
"We've still got work to do to be the team we want to be, and to be consistently challenging all teams in the competition, and we won't waste a day, we won't waste a week in our pursuit of doing that.
"Ultimately, our challenge is to be a really strong footy team again."
Goodwin said he hadn't looked back on a late second-quarter incident that saw Kysaiah Pickett floored by a bump from Butters, possibly affecting the Demons star's game.
Pickett gathered 14 disposals and kicked three goals in the first half, but went to the rooms after the hit and only had two touches in the second half.
"I haven't had a look… it wouldn't be great for me to comment on it because I genuinely haven't had a look. Kozzy went off for an HIA, he passed and came back on."
He also said he had no doubt about Christian Petracca's commitment to the contest when it was suggested his superstar may have pulled up short when running back with the flight of the ball.
"Trac's right back to his best, he'll go to every contest the way he normally would," Goodwin said.
"(Last year’s injury) is well in the past. We've moved forward and Christian's spent a lot of time working on that stuff. No, he’s fine."
