Max Gawn has claimed the 2018 Shadforth Financial Group AFL Coaches Association champion player of the year award. The win means Gawn is the first ruckman to claim prestigious award. He produced the win to upset Carlton midfielder Patrick Cripps, by six votes.
Brownlow favourite, Hawthorn’s Tom Mitchell finished third polling 88 votes. Whilst Collingwood ruckman Brodie Grundy finished fourth on 82 votes.
Melbourne’s Clayton Oliver, Western Bulldogs’ Jack Macrae and Brisbane’s Dayne Beams came in equal fifth on 72 votes.
The award is decided by votes from AFL coaches, who vote one a 5-4-3-2-1 basis each round.
“Coaches have a unique perspective on what succeeds in each of the 198 games in the AFL’s home & away season…Max should be very proud to win this award,” AFLCA chief Mark Brayshaw said.
“We think the Coaches Award is the most prestigious of all the individual Awards in the AFL, because the 18 groups of coaches take such care in allocating their votes.”
Former Gold Coast Suns’ player and current Geelong super-star Gary Ablett has won the award three times, between 2007 and 2009. Whilst other winners, since 2003 include; Nathan Buckley, Warren Tredrea, Barry Hall, Simon Goodwin, Adam Goodes, Dane Swan, Marc Murphy, Trent Cotchin, Scott Pendlebury, Robbie Gray, Dan Hannebery, Patrick Dangerfield and Dustin Martin.
Gawn claimed the award on 97 votes, ahead of Cripps who despite playing in only two wins all seasons reached 91 votes.
Cripps has achieved multiple accolades this season. He was voted best-on-ground in seven games this seasons and managed nine games of eight votes or more. He also surpassed Geelong player and Brownlow medalist, Patrick Dangerfield with the most contested possessions in a home and away season with 388, which he achieved in Carlton’s game against the Crows at Etihad stadium on Saturday.
The award comes after both Gawn and Cripps were named in the All-Australian squad for 2018 earlier in the week.
Image by Flickerd [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], from Wikimedia Commons
