Page 56 - AFL QUEENSLAND 2012 YEAR IN REVIEW

GROGAN MEDAL AWARDS NIGHT
THREE-WAY TIE IN MEDAL COUNT
Labrador’s Ryan Davey, Southport’s Fraser Pope and Redland’s Tom Salter tied for the 2012 Grogan Medal in the fourth triple dead heat in the long and proud history of the game’s highest individual honor in Queensland.
In one of the lowest winning counts on record, Davey hung on to share the award with the fast-finishing Pope and Salter on 14 votes as the top 12 vote-getters were separated by just three votes, as decided by the 3-2-1 votes of NEAFL umpires.
Davey, who missed the last six games of the season with a foot injury, polled his last votes in Round 12 and had an agonising wait through a further nine rounds of the home-and-away season before finishing at the top of the leaderboard.
This capped a sensational year for the 26-year-old midfielder, who was in his second year with the Tigers after moving north from Warrigal in Gippsland in 2011.
Davey also won the Zane Taylor Medal when judged best afield for the NEAFL Northern Conference representative side in their monstrous 145-point win over the Eastern Conference.
Pope, 24, a Southport junior who returned home this season after a stint with VFL club Coburg, picked up his votes in the reverse order. He didn’t poll at all in the first seven rounds and only finished with the leaders when he picked up five votes in the last two rounds.
Salter, 22, in his fourth season with Redland after being recruited from Tasmania, also finished with a barnstorming run, collecting two three-vote ratings in the last four games.
Davey polled seven times in his 12 games, including three best afield three-vote ratings, while Pope, who played 15 home-and- away games, scored maximum votes four times and was among the votes a total of five times. Salter, who didn’t miss a game, was best afield three times and on the voting card six times.
In an extraordinary count, Redland’s Scott Clouston, Broadbeach’s Ezra Poyas and NT Thunder’s Matt Rosier each polled 13 votes to finish one vote behind the winners, while Southport’s Jason Burge, Aspley’s Matthew Payne and the NT’s Jason Roe each polled 12 votes and Broadbeach’s Jason Eagle, the Gold Coast SUNS’ Josh Fraser and the Brisbane Lions’ Patrick Karnezis polled 11 votes.
Gavin Grose topped the Mt.Gravatt vote with seven, while Adam Spackman did likewise at Morningside, also with seven votes.
In other major awards announced tonight at the annual Grogan Medal dinner at the Gabba:-
•
Clouston, a former Brisbane Lions rookie, scored
a runaway win in the Syd Guildford Trophy for the NEAFL Northern Conference Player of the Year as voted by NEAFL coaches and officials. He collected 50 votes to beat NT Thunder’s Jake Dignan (34), Davey (20), Roe (17) and Labrador’s Todd Grayson (15).
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2012 Year in Review