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Marcus Bontempelli would be an overdue and popular winner of the Brownlow Medal and it would be surprising if he did not finish top two in the players’ Most Valuable Player award.
The Bulldogs captain is favourite for both the Brownlow and Wednesday night’s Leigh Matthews Trophy, albeit Melbourne’s Christian Petracca, his foremost rival for the mantle of the game’s most complete and influential midfielder, shapes as a competitor for those honours.
Charlie Curnow has been near unstoppable for Carlton in 2023.Credit: Getty Images
But if we can be certain that a midfielder will claim “Charlie” (or a hybrid midfielder/half-back if Nick Daicos gets up), the players’ award really should be taken by Charlie Curnow, just ahead of “The Bont”, Petracca and another match-turner with Buckley’s chance of winning, Toby Greene.
Curnow’s 78 goals for an often stodgy Carlton this year is the equivalent of 100 or even 110 in the period before the 2010s, after which defensive tactics rendered it nigh-impossible for key forwards to come close to a century.
But just as Lance Franklin went unrecognised by his peers in 2008, when he booted a home-and-away 100 for the eventual premier (the MVP went to Gary Ablett jnr), there seems little prospect that Curnow be named MVP. Indeed, it would be surprising, based on past voting, if Curnow or GWS skipper Greene finished in the top three.
At one point, the Leigh Matthews Trophy carried the potential to be a different kind of award to the Brownlow and all the media gongs. It was won twice by Wayne Carey in the ’90s, when he was the game’s supreme player, once by Jason Dunstall at his zenith (’92), Gary Ablett snr (’93), Tony Lockett (’87) and even by a young Nick Riewoldt in ’04, by which stage the Brownlow was unreachable to anyone in key positions.
Since then, the players’ award has been exclusive to midfielders. And while all the winners – Ablett jnr having won a staggering five MVPs – have been deserving, the award has failed to fulfil its purported mission of identifying the player who most influences results.
Curnow and Greene have been the central in their teams’ late-season surges into the finals. Toby has booted 60 goals, a massive haul for a non-key forward, and averaged 1.1 goal assists; the case for Greene as MVP would consider, too, that he delivers in the critical moments, as when he snapped the game-winner from a stoppage against the Swans and in that improbable comeback victory over the Bulldogs in round 18.