West Coast premiership hero and Port Adelaide forward Willie Rioli has retired from football.<\/p>\n
The Power confirmed the news late on Monday, days after their season ended with an emotional win over Gold Coast at Adelaide Oval.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old shifted clubs after the 2022 season and played 57 games for the Power after 51 at the Eagles. Rioli said he made the decision a number of weeks ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cI retire knowing I\u2019ve given all I can to the game at the highest level,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI made up my mind a couple of weeks\u2019 ago that this would be my last season and it was great to finish on such a high last Friday night at Adelaide Oval.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve loved my time at both Port Adelaide and West Coast and made lifelong friends. And I thank the Glenelg Football Club for everything they did for me in preparing me for the AFL.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thank everyone who has provided me with such great support across my journey and I\u2019ll reach out personally to all those who have helped me along the way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rioli kicked a goal in the Eagles\u2019 2018 grand final win over Collingwood. In a statement released by Port Adelaide, he paid tribute to West Coast fans.<\/p>\n
The small forward had maintained a strong relationship with the Eagles and last year travelled to Perth for his premiership coach Adam Simpson\u2019s farewell match .<\/p>\n
\u201cIn particular, I want to acknowledge the fans at Port Adelaide and West Coast who gave me so much love and support,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI now look forward to playing my role in helping the next generation of First Nations\u2019 players coming through.\u201d<\/p>\n
He finished with 151 goals from 109 games after he was drafted by the Eagles from Glenelg with pick 51 in 2016.<\/p>\n
But Rioli\u2019s career was, at times, littered with controversy.<\/p>\n
He featured 18 times in his tumultuous final year, which included a ban for using threatening language towards Western Bulldogs defender Bailey Dale, a social media outburst after a clash with Hawthorn and a late-season stint in the SANFL.<\/p>\n
He was recalled for the final two matches of the season and kicked two goals against Fremantle before struggling in the win over the Suns.<\/p>\n
In 2021 he was banned for two years \u2014 one season of which was backdated \u2014 for tampering with a urine sample used in a drug test.<\/p>\n
At his best, Rioli was one of the most damaging and creative small forwards in the game. He kicked 64 goals across his first two seasons at Port Adelaide \u2014 arguably the peak of his powers \u2014 despite missing several games and was commanding the best defenders in the league each week.<\/p>\n
The proud Tiwi Islands product launched onto the AFL stage with 28 goals in a stunning debut season in 2018, which finished in a premiership.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s incredibly skilled and exciting to watch, and played a key role in our top 4 finishes in 2023 and 2024 as a goalkicking small forward,\u201d Power football boss Chris Davies said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWillie will always be part of the Port Adelaide Football Club and we wish him and his family all the best for the next chapter of their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Power also farewelled long-serving senior coach Ken Hinkley and its games-record holder Travis Boak on Friday night.<\/p>\n
More to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"West Coast premiership hero and Port Adelaide forward Willie Rioli has retired from football. The Power confirmed the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":94756,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[638,64,63,588,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-94755","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-sport","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}