Port Adelaide v Sydney

Sydney are the best team in the AFL in 2026. Their 10–2 record is the best in the competition, they’re 7–0 at home, and they’ve produced some of the most dominant wins of the season: +128 at West Coast, +114 vs Richmond, +66 at the Bulldogs, +44 vs Brisbane, and +41 vs GWS. When the Swans are firing, they don’t just win — they annihilate.

Port Adelaide at 4–8 are in the bottom half of the ladder and struggling for consistency. They’re 2–4 at Adelaide Oval this season, which removes any notion of home-ground advantage. Their most recent home game was a 34-point loss to Carlton (R11).

The quality gap between these sides is the largest of any match this round outside Brisbane-Richmond. Sydney’s scoring power is extraordinary — they’ve scored 100+ in nine of twelve games. Port don’t have the defensive structure to contain that.

All 29 Squiggle models agree: Sydney, at 71.4% confidence with an average margin of +19.6. We’re going slightly higher at 20 because Port’s home record offers no protection.

Sydney’s 2026 season has been remarkable. Ten wins from twelve games, 7–0 at home, and a series of scorelines that look like typos: 163–35 at West Coast, 170–56 vs Richmond, 126–60 at the Bulldogs. They’ve scored 100+ in nine of twelve matches and their average winning margin in victories is over 50 points.

Their only losses came to Hawthorn by 17 (R2, away) and Geelong by 27 (R11, away). Both were on the road against quality opponents. When Sydney travel, they’re slightly more vulnerable — but 3–2 away is still a strong record.

Port Adelaide’s season has been a slow-motion decline. They started with promise — a 63-point win over Essendon (R2) and a 30-point win over Geelong (R7) — but have lost six of their last seven games. The Carlton loss (–34 at home, R11) was a low point. They scraped a 6-point win at West Coast in R13 but that’s against the worst team in the competition.

The H2H between these teams is even at 3–3 in the last six meetings. But the results are wildly volatile. Port Adelaide won 148–36 at Adelaide Oval in 2024 R21 — a 112-point demolition of the Swans. It’s one of the biggest wins in the history of this fixture.

But Sydney have dominated the rest of the recent meetings: winning by 36 (2024 Prelim Final), 19 (2025 R15 at Adelaide Oval), and narrowly losing by 8 at the SCG (2025 R6). The 2024 outlier aside, Sydney are clearly the better team in this matchup.

Adelaide Oval is nominally Port’s home ground, but they’re 2–4 there this season. Home advantage has been non-existent. Sydney won at Adelaide Oval by 19 as recently as 2025 R15.

Sydney’s away vulnerability. The Swans are 3–2 away from home, with losses to Hawthorn and Geelong. Both defeats came against top-eight sides at fortress venues. Port Adelaide at Adelaide Oval, sitting at 2–4 at home, is a very different proposition. Sydney should travel well.

Port’s scoring problem. In their last seven games, Port Adelaide have lost six. They’re averaging just 71 points in those losses against an average concession of 90+. They simply can’t score enough to keep up with quality opponents — and Sydney are the highest-scoring team in the competition.

Can Port repeat 2024? The 148–36 result at Adelaide Oval is the ghost in this matchup. Port showed they can produce extraordinary performances against Sydney at this venue. But that was a different Port Adelaide side — one that made a Preliminary Final. This year’s version is 4–8 and in decline.

The form gap, the scoring power, the venue (where Port are 2–4), and the model consensus (29/29) all point the same way. Sydney are the class of the 2026 season and Port Adelaide don’t have the tools to stop them.

We’ve respected Port’s Adelaide Oval record in this specific matchup (the 2024 outlier) by not tipping a 30+ margin. But 20 points feels right for the quality difference between a 10–2 side and a 4–8 side.