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The Roar’s AFL top 50 wrap: The full list, who voted for who, team of the top 50, plus best clubs

14th March, 2020
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14th March, 2020
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It took intense debate, but Dustin Martin edged out Nat Fyfe to be crowned the best player in the AFL by our expert panel.

The top 50 has been completely revealed, so now it’s time to expose the cogs and gears and look at exactly how everyone voted, as well as how each club fared individually.

If you’ve forgotten the process, we got five of our AFL experts – Jay Croucher, Cam Rose, Adrian Polykandrites, Josh Elliott and myself – to name their top 60 players in the league today. Players were then given points based on where they ranked on each list – 60 points for being ranked no.1 down to one point for being ranked no.60 – with the final top 50 ranking being determined by the total number of points each player accrued across the five lists.

To start, let’s look at how each club rated.

All but three clubs – Essendon, Gold Coast and St Kilda – are represented in the top 50. Interestingly, those are the same three clubs who didn’t have anyone named to last year’s 40-man All-Australian squad – so before you have a crack at our experts over the exclusions, we’ve been backed up strongly!

But while the Bombers and Saints had representation on some individual expert lists, the Suns did not rate a mention at all! Are you surprised? Of course not.

No surprises that last year’s grand finalists account for a whopping 15 players on this list, although it’s the Giants surprisingly edging out the Tigers with eight representatives to seven. The West Coast Eagles come in at third with six, while the Brisbane Lions round out the top four with five selections. Five teams had two selections.

The top 50 by club
GWS Giants: 8
Richmond: 7
West Coast Eagles: 6
Brisbane Lions: 5
Collingwood: 4
Geelong Cats: 3
North Melbourne: 3
Western Bulldogs: 3
Fremantle: 2
Hawthorn: 2
Melbourne: 2
Port Adelaide: 2
Sydney Swans: 2
Carlton: 1
Adelaide Crows: 1
Essendon: 0
Gold Coast Suns: 0
St Kilda: 0

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Toby Greene

The Giants are well-represented in the top 50. (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

Putting a ‘team of the top 50’ together was much harder exercise than in the NRL, given players don’t have the same strict positions across codes. If we just put the top 22 players in, we’d have a lot of midfielders and key forwards and not much else.

Instead, I decided to limit midfielders to their usual positions, while giving them both half-forward flanks (the AA selectors do this all the time) and all but one interchange spot.

I also limited the forward and defensive set-ups to three key talls each, which was much more of a problem for the forwards than the backs.

In any case, this team would be virtually unbeatable.

The Roar’s AFL team of the top 50
B: Dylan Grimes, Harris Andrews, James Sicily
HB: Bachar Houli, Jeremy McGovern, Lachie Whitfield
C: Patrick Dangerfield, Patrick Cripps, Tim Kelly
HF: Marcus Bontempelli, Tom J Lynch, Stephen Coniglio
F: Jordan de Goey, Jeremy Cameron, Lance Franklin
FOL: Brodie Grundy, Nat Fyfe, Dustin Martin
I/C: Max Gawn, Scott Pendlebury, Josh Kelly, Elliot Yeo

Nat Fyfe

Nat Fyfe. (Photo by Daniel Carson/AFL Media/Getty Images)

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And, of course, the part of the article you’ve really been waiting for. Here is the final list, including the points values for every player, a full list of the players who were in the conversation but didn’t quite make the cut as well as how each expert did their individual top 60.

You can filter these tables to sort by any column you’d like.

Rank Player Club Points Josh Cam Adrian Stirling Jay
01 Dustin Martin Richmond 298 01 02 01 02 01
02 Nat Fyfe Fremantle 297 02 01 02 01 02
03 Marcus Bontempelli Western Bulldogs 285 05 04 04 04 03
04 Patrick Dangerfield Geelong 284 04 05 03 05 04
05 Patrick Cripps Carlton 280 08 03 06 03 05
06 Brodie Grundy Collingwood 267 12 06 05 09 06
07 Tim Kelly West Coast 253 16 07 15 07 07
08 Stephen Coniglio GWS Giants 252 13 08 07 10 15
09 Jeremy Cameron GWS Giants 247 03 13 13 08 21
10 Josh Kelly GWS Giants 245 07 09 12 15 17
11 Elliot Yeo West Coast 244 09 16 16 11 09
12 Max Gawn Melbourne 244 11 20 08 14 08
13 Tom J Lynch Richmond 242 15 12 14 12 10
14 Jeremy McGovern West Coast 236 10 10 09 18 22
15 Lachie Neale Brisbane 230 29 11 10 06 19
16 Scott Pendlebury Collingwood 219 14 15 33 13 11
17 Lachie Whitfield GWS Giants 211 19 14 18 27 16
18 Lance Franklin Sydney 207 24 19 26 16 13
19 Jordan de Goey Collingwood 197 17 23 17 23 28
20 Jack Riewoldt Richmond 196 23 18 22 26 20
21 Harris Andrews Brisbane 186 25 22 24 25 23
22 Luke Shuey West Coast 185 18 31 29 24 18
23 Jack Macrae Western Bulldogs 173 06 38 35 21 32
24 Tom Hawkins Geelong 171 22 33 25 17 37
25 Michael Walters Fremantle 165 26 28 31 29 26
26 Jack Darling West Coast 165 28 25 21 30 36
27 Dayne Zorko Brisbane 156 31 24 36 20 38
28 Clayton Oliver Melbourne 149 42 40 11 38 25
29 Ben Brown North Melbourne 148 21 35 27 28 46
30 Toby Greene GWS Giants 141 45 21 19 19 60
31 Charlie Cameron Brisbane 130 35 27 45 33 35
32 Tom Mitchell Hawthorn 118 41 17 56 12
33 James Sicily Hawthorn 116 33 32 20 60 44
34 Adam Treloar Collingwood 114 39 36 38 37 41
35 Dylan Grimes Richmond 108 36 51 52 34 24
36 Travis Boak Port Adelaide 095 40 30 45 34
37 Bachar Houli Richmond 090 32 32 29
38 Dion Prestia Richmond 088 38 47 58 41 33
39 Tim Taranto GWS Giants 086 60 30 48 22 59
40 Shaun Higgins North Melbourne 085 37 37 35 50
41 Isaac Heeney Sydney 085 43 39 28 49
42 Tom Stewart Geelong 081 27 14
43 Ben Cunnington North Melbourne 077 51 48 40 42 47
44 Andrew Gaff West Coast 074 49 58 32 31
45 Robbie Gray Port Adelaide 074 45 47 51 27
46 Josh Dunkley Western Bulldogs 073 30 37 59 50 56
47 Hugh McCluggage Brisbane 068 26 42 47
48 Nick Vlastuin Richmond 067 48 56 44 39 51
49 Phil Davis GWS Giants 065 56 55 23 52 54
50 Rory Sloane Adelaide 059 34 59 31
50 Zac Williams GWS Giants 059 49 41 43 52
52 Shane Edwards Richmond 058 34 48 43
53 Dane Rampe Sydney 056 46 53 40 49
54 Nick Haynes GWS Giants 056 57 29 57 45
55 Shannon Hurn West Coast 053 54 46 30
56 Dylan Shiel Essendon 052 53 44 57 44 55
57 Brad Hill St Kilda 047 20 55
58 Trent Cotchin Richmond 041 41 40
59 Zach Merrett Essendon 040 43 39
60 Tom Papley Sydney 031 55 36
61 Josh J Kennedy West Coast 029 50 43
62 Luke Parker Sydney 028 46 56 53
63 Jack Billings St Kilda 027 34
64 Jake Lloyd Sydney 024 52 46
65 Aaron Naughton Western Bulldogs 023 50 49
66 Mark Blicavs Geelong 022 39
67 Jade Gresham St Kilda 019 42
68 Steele Sidebottom Collingwood 019 42
69 Gary Ablett Geelong 017 44
70 Tim Membrey St Kilda 016 47 59
71 Callan Ward GWS Giants 015 54 53
72 Jaeger O’Meara Hawthorn 014 60 48
73 Mitch Duncan Geelong 014 53 55
74 Christian Petracca Melbourne 011 50
75 Josh P Kennedy Sydney 010 58 54
76 Darcy Moore Collingwood 010 51
77 James Worpel Hawthorn 009 52
78 Jacob Weitering Carlton 007 54
79 Brad Crouch Adelaide 005 59 58
80 Matt Crouch Adelaide 004 57
81 Nic Naitanui West Coast 004 57
82 Rory Laird Adelaide 003 58
83 Todd Goldstein North Melbourne 001 60

It was an extremely fun process putting this list together and we hope you enjoyed reading and debating it just as much as we did.

Until the ball is finally bounced on Thursday, why not have a re-read of the top 50 countdown itself?

The best players in the AFL, 50-41
The best players in the AFL, 40-31
The best players in the AFL, 30-21
The best players in the AFL, 20-11
The best players in the AFL, 10-1

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