Mid West players rack up votes during the AFL’s night of nights at the Brownlow Medal count

It was the AFL’s night of nights on Tuesday with the Brownlow Medal count, and while Northampton’s Patrick Cripps didn’t go back-to-back with the award, Mid West players still polled votes through the season. Coming off his Brownlow winning season last year, Cripps backed it up with an impressive showing at this year’s count trying to defend his medal. The Charlie was eventually won by Brisbane’s Lachie Neale, who was Cripps’ runner-up last year by just one vote. The Carlton captain finished in the top 10, polling 22 votes in a highly competitive race after a strong start to the year and was at the helm of Carlton’s late season winning streak. Cripps had five games where he polled full votes, the first came from the Blues round three win against the Giants where he had a career high 42 disposals, with 17 kicks and 13 clearances. The Northampton product had three votes in a round six loss to St Kilda but the most significant might have been from the round 14 win against the Suns, the turning point for Carltons season. Blues teammate and former Towns gun Jack Martin had an impressive season during the Blues second half run and earnt one vote during Carlton’s massive win over Collingwood in round 20. Martin kicked a-season high 3.1 in the win, with 12 disposals, five marks, two tackles and had one goal assist. Another member of the Northampton footy factory earnt some votes on the night and cousin of Carlton star, Jamie Cripps, earnt all three votes in the Eagles upset round 23 victory over the Bulldogs. Cripps put the team on his back during the win with five goals, 17 disposals, three marks, eight tackles, four clearances and one goal assist. While Fremantle had a disappointing year, they welcomed the addition of WA boy and former Railways star Jaeger O’Meara. In his first season in the purple and white, O’Meara managed to nab himself one vote in the Dockers round 10 win over Geelong. During the win, O’Meara had 26 disposals, took two marks, made six tackles and had nine clearances. A big talking point of the night came from some questionable voting, and in Sydney’s round two thumping over Hawthorn, young forward Joel Amartey received three votes after being subbed out half way through the match. The three votes should have arguably gone to Coorow-Latham’s Logan McDonald, who was given one vote in the game where he kicked 5.1, with 13 disposals, took five marks and played 84 per cent time on ground. The top vote getter for Fremantle was an ineligible Caleb Serong with 24, while for West Coast it was Tim Kelly with 11.