Fremantle midfielder Kiara Bowers has been acknowledged for her outstanding 2019 season with a runner-up finish in the AFLW Players’ Most Valuable Player Award.
Bowers polled 107 votes to finish behind winner Erin Phillips of Adelaide (143 votes).
Bowers also finished second in the Most Courageous Award, polling 84 votes behind winner Chelsea Randall of Adelaide (105 votes).
Bowers had an impressive start to her debut AFLW season and finished with style with starring roles in Freo’s wins in rounds five, six and seven.
She set an AFLW record with 89 tackles for the season and also led Fremantle for disposals, clearances, metres gained and ranking points.
Forward Sabreena Duffy was also acknowledged as one of the games best young players, finishing third in the Best First Year Player Award.
WINNERS AND TOP POLLING PLAYERS
AFLW Players’ MVP
Erin Phillips, Adelaide Crows – 143
Kiara Bowers, Fremantle Dockers – 107
Ashleigh Brazill, Collingwood Magpies – 85
Most Courageous
Chelsea Randall, Adelaide Crows – 105
Kiara Bowers, Fremantle Dockers – 84
Brianna Davey, Carlton Blues – 35
Best Captain
Brianna Davey, Carlton Blues – 53
Erin Phillips, Adelaide Crows – 52
Chelsea Randall, Adelaide Crows – 45
Best First Year Player Award
Madison Prespakis, Carlton Blues – 149
Alyce Parker, GWS Giants – 35
Sabreena Duffy, Fremantle Dockers – 26
MVP Voting Process
MVP voting is a two-stage process, beginning with each player voting for the three teammates they consider to have been the most valuable this season. Each club’s votes are then tallied to form a nomination list, with 33 players across the 10 teams nominated for the award – due to a tie, Adelaide and North Melbourne featured an extra nominees.
In the second round of voting, all players vote for their MVP on a 3, 2, 1 basis from the nominees of the nine other clubs. The votes are tallied and the player with the highest score wins the honour of MVP. Players cannot vote for their own teammates in stage two of the process.
A similar process is followed for Best First Year Player, Most Courageous, but every captain is automatically nominated for the Best Captain Award.
