St Kilda’s longest serving skipper Nick Riewoldt has narrowly been beaten by Adelaide’s Taylor Walker in the AFL Player’s Association Best Captain award on Tuesday night.
Riewoldt, who announced his decision to hand over the captaincy at this month’s Trevor Barker Award, polled the second most votes (111), behind Crows skipper Taylor Walker (127).
The pair finished ahead of Greater Western Sydney’s Callan Ward (109), Hawthorn’s Luke Hodge (76) and Geelong’s Joel Selwood (61), in an award voted on purely by their peers.
First-year midfielder-forward Jade Gresham also featured prominently in voting on the night, finishing in fourth position in the AFLPA’s best first-year player award.
Sydney Swans star Callum Mills added the award to the Rising Star prize he won last week – Gresham finished equal sixth – winning the award comfortably (328 votes), ahead of Essendon’s Darcy Parish (137) and Carlton’s Jacob Weitering (108).
In the centrepiece of the night, the Leigh Matthews Trophy, Geelong superstar Patrick Dangerfield easily won his first Most Valuable Player award, polling nearly 1000 votes more than any other player in the competition to be a unanimous winner.
Adelaide midfielder Rory Sloane finished in second place, ahead of Richmond game breaker Dustin Martin, while Melbourne ruckman Max Gawn and Crows excitement machine Eddie Betts tied for fourth.
Time is running out to win the Saints Super Draw! Be in the running to WIN by clicking here
AFLPA MVP AWARD WINNERS AND VOTING
Most Valuable Player – Leigh Matthews Trophy
1. Patrick Dangerfield (Geelong) – 1369
2. Rory Sloane (Adelaide) – 443
3. Dustin Martin (Richmond) – 297
=4. Max Gawn (Melbourne) – 238
=4. Eddie Betts (Adelaide) – 238
6. Luke Parker (Sydney Swans) – 218
7. Alex Rance (Richmond) – 188
8. Marcus Bontempelli (Western Bulldogs) – 179
9. Tom Lynch (Gold Coast) – 170
10. Josh Kennedy (West Coast) – 164
Robert Rose Most Courageous Player Award Luke Parker (Sydney Swans)
Best First Year Player Award Callum Mills (Sydney Swans)
Best Captain Taylor Walker (Adelaide)
MVP Voting Process
MVP voting is a two-stage process, beginning with each player voting for the three teammates he considers to have been the most valuable this season. Each club’s votes are then tallied to form a nomination list comprising 54 players across the 18 teams.
In the second round of voting, all players vote for their MVP on a 3, 2, 1 basis from the nominees of the 17 other clubs. The votes are tallied and the player with the highest score wins the honour of MVP. Players cannot vote for their own teammates in stage two of the process.
A similar process is followed for Best First Year Player and Most Courageous, but every captain is automatically nominated for the Best Captain Award.
