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AFL top 100: Bring on Round 2 (Part 1)

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Roar Guru
9th May, 2020
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As it looks more and more likely that we will have a footy season of some form in 2020, we should at least have a group on players who – although not as fit as normal – will have had time to recover from any injuries.

On that basis, we can expect a number of milestones – both traditional and historical – to be equalled or broken right across the AFL, both in terms of games and goals.

Leading the list of traditional milestone achievers (multiples of 50 games or goals) is Geelong’s Patrick Dangerfield with 250 games. After 154 games at Adelaide (which still places him at number 23 in the Crows’ top 100 game-players) he moved on to Geelong, where he has played 95 games in just over four years.

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Even at this impressive rate, it will still take him all the 2020 season and most of the 2021 season to rack up the 37 games needed to become a member of Geelong’s top 100 game-players.

A sign of the times is the fact that – like Dangerfield – three of the five other potential achievers of traditional AFL milestones have chalked up their totals with at least two clubs.

Jasper Pittard, after eight good years at Port Adelaide, moved to North Melbourne at the start of 2019. He did enough at Port Adelaide to still be ranked number 36 in the top 100 game-players for the club. His next game will be his 150th in the AFL.

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Jasper Pittard.

(Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

He is also still ranked equal 94th among the Power’s top 100 goal-scorers, but with Xavier Duursma, Dan Houston, Tom Rockliff, Riley Bonner and possibly even Darcy Bryne-Jones poised to move ahead of him it will be interesting to see how long he retains his goal-kicking top 100 status.

Robbie Tarrant, the brother of Collingwood and Fremantle’s Chris, is one of the two one-club players who will reach the 150 AFL games milestone next game. Tarrant currently sits on 149 games at North Melbourne with Kevin Dynon, a member of North’s first grand final team in 1950, as well as Daniel Harris and Jess Sinclair, who both played a season at other clubs: Gold Coast and Fremantle respectively.

On 150 games, he will draw level with the biggest man in the league in the 1920s and 1930s, John Lewis, who also played with another club: Melbourne.

Speaking of Melbourne, the other one-club player to shortly reach the 150 AFL game milestone is Neville Jetta. Jetta – like his cousin Lewis (Sydney and West Coast) – was recruited from WAFL club Swan Districts. He turned 30 this year and currently lies in equal 60th position on the Demons’ top 100 game-players list with Lance Arnold and Andrew Obst.

His 150th game will see him move up to equal 57th alongside the late John Phillip “Sean” Wight, who – although born in Scotland – was part of Melbourne’s Irish experiment in the 1980s. Jetta will also join Darwinian Matthew Whelan, and Jared Rivers, who finished his career with three years at Geelong.

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The most talked-about footballer after the end of the 2019 season, Tim Kelly, turned out for his first game with the West Coast Eagles in Round 1 this year, still donning the number 11 he wore at Geelong in his two years as a Cat.

In his 49th game, did not disappoint, kicking the one-goal average he has managed over his career and obtaining 19 disposals – the sixth best for the Eagles. All being equal, game 50 will come in Round 2.

Jacob Townsend, now on his third club (Essendon), should also reach 50 games in Round 2. After starting at the fledgling GWS club, where his 28 games and four goals are still enough for him to feature in the Giants’ top 100 game-players and goal-scorers lists, Townsend moved on to Richmond for a further 20 games and 28 goals. Townsend kicked three goals in his one game at the Bombers and is now on the brink of 50 games.

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