Racing
League
Rugby
Cricket
Golf
Motorsport
Combat Sports
Football
Netball
Basketball
Other Sports
Sport Nation
Find your frequency hereCornes: Hinkley made Port relevant
Nicholas Quinlan • August 23rd, 2025 3:34 pm
Kane Cornes has given his thoughts about the legacy that Ken Hinkley has left on Port Adelaide.
Hinkley’s legacy is certainly an interesting one. Despite not having won a premiership for the Power, he has been one of the most successful coaches in the AFL based on overall performance.
During his 13-season tenure, Hinkley has taken Port Adelaide to the finals in seven of those seasons and managed to reach the preliminary finals four times despite not making the Grand Final.
And barring this season, he has managed to win 10 games or more during the home and away season every year he has be in charge, showing why Port Adelaide has kept him for so long.
Cornes, who played under Hinkley for the last three seasons of his career, believes that Hinkley is the reason why the club is relevant today, having taken them from the days of playing in front of tarps at Football Park to a consistent finals contender.
“He made the club relevant,” Cornes stated on SEN’s Crunch Time.
“They were an absolute mess financially. No one wanted to turn up and watch them play.
“(They) sacked the coach. The President had gone.
“So, to get there and go from five wins in 2012 and winning a final the following year and made the club relevant again. That’s his legacy.
“I think his players always played for him. He was willing to play an exciting brand of football that people wanted to watch.
“Did he stay too long? In hindsight, would he have made the call to leave a little bit earlier and be coaching another club by now? I don’t know.
“But (he is a) great person, as honest as anything and just a great footy person that I think made the footy club relevant.”
Gerard Whateley asked Cornes whether he thought Hinkley would coach again.
“I don’t know,” Cornes said.
“I’m interested to hear how the industry views him because Port Adelaide fans and I have gone at this for a long time.
“There has been a level of disrespect from them to the coach he has been, and to listen to Damien Hardwick speak so glowingly about him and the great coach that he is.
“Well, I hope Port fans are listening to this, and I hope you know what you had was pretty good, and I hope you know the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.
“Now, I’m not saying it’s not time and it is probably time (to move on), but yeah, I didn’t think they gave him the respect he deserved.
“It’s hard to win games of footy. Hard to make finals as we’re finding out. Hard to make prelim finals, which he did, but didn’t get to where he wanted to go.”
With Port Adelaide’s season coming to an end on Friday night, it will now see assistant coach Josh Carr fulfil his part of the coaching succession and take over the reins from Hinkley from next year.
