Think you are an AFL buff?

Each of the questions below has two correct answers, not one. Thanks to Graeme Russell, who sends the questions in, and to Graeme's friend Herb, who writes them. The questions are both difficult and very, very clever!

Thanks also to Elizabeth McEvey for her 100%(!) record in answering correctly and to Anne & Bob Stubbings, Brian McLean, Bruce Byrne, Gillian Payne, Greg Scott, Helen Bardsley, Jenni Bull, Julie Allen, Kevin Gillett, Laraine Hussey, Pam Griffith, Pam Hislop, Ros Hardy and Sandra Slattery for their often correct answers.

Question 33

This former St Kilda reserves VFL/AFL footballer never reached the ranks of senior league football, and his wealth, fame and notoriety all rest on his non-footballing activities. He amassed significant wealth, at one time has lived in Brighton, and was once reported to have sold a house there for around 10 million dollars. At different times in his life, he has been troubled by addiction behaviour, has been the subject of abundant public criticism and, for someone who was very successful in his field, he may at times have shown questionable judgement and poor decision making.

The two answers

Rod Butterss and Shane Warne.

Question 32

This former Carlton VFL/AFL footballer was born between the end of World War 2 and the time when television and the Olympic Games came to Australia in the 1950s. Less than 180cm tall, he was a player of a type that would today be called a small midfielder. He played in a period of Carlton success and was a member of two or three Carlton premiership teams, the last of which was in the second year of the decade when he was 26 years old. After his career at Princes Park was over, he transferred clubs, moving to the Bulldogs, where he played for two or three seasons in the number 17 guernsey.

The two answers

Adrian Gallagher (nickname: Gags) and Phil Maylin (nickname: Shark).

Question 31

This former VFL/AFL champion was born and raised in South Australia and recruited to his Victorian club from a SANFL team. He was fortunate to play for a club who were the champion team of the era and his decorated career includes three premierships won within a five-season span, twice best and fairest, and All Australian selection five times or thereabouts. While high guernsey numbers are often considered unfashionable, and players given high guernsey numbers early in their careers often change to a lower number when the opportunity arises, this champion wore the same guernsey number, 44, for every one of his more than 250 game career.

The two answers

Corey Enright (nickname: Boris) and John Platten (nickname: The Rat).

Question 30

This present-day AFL footballer was born in a Hawthorn premiership year in the late 1980s. He began his AFL days at Essendon but later transferred to an Adelaide club, where he wore the number 20 guernsey. A giant of a man at almost 200cm tall, he has played almost all his football in the ruck or as a forward. After the 2019 season, he left his Adelaide team, transferring clubs and returning to Victoria.

The two answers

Josh Jenkins and Paddy Ryder.

Question 29

This former champion VFL/AFL player was fortunate enough to arrive at his team in a timely manner to play in the club’s first premiership team for 50 years or more. His playing style was characterised by fleetness of foot, sureness of touch, and grace and ease of movement. At one stage of his career he had a nickname derived from an animal well known for its running speed, or ironic lack thereof. He won two Brownlow medals, one in a year when his team lost the Grand Final. He won club best and fairest and All Australian selection and played more than 290 games in a career of a decade and a half or more. He polled 164 career Brownlow votes, give or take a vote, and is just outside the top 20 on a list of the greatest career Brownlow vote pollers of all time.

The two answers

Adam Goodes and Keith Grieg.

Question 28

This former VFL coach was, in the space of just over a year, twice close witness to the tragic spectre of spinal trauma and quadriplegia in a young VFL footballer. The first tragedy occurred when a member of his own family broke his neck in a motor car accident in early 1974. The second tragedy was just over a year later and happened on the football field: coaching at a game at the Western Oval between Footscray and Fitzroy early in the 1975 season, the coach in question saw a new Footscray recruit from Adelaide, playing only his second VFL game, collected in a head high collision and rendered quadriplegic.

The two answers

Bob Rose and Kevin Rose.

Question 27

This VFL/AFL footballer has, for most or all of his playing career, been the shortest footballer in the league. One of his names might bring to mind Bible stories, and a book of the Old Testament or some epistles of an Apostle in the New. The first three letters of his other name are suggestive of heat or energy. Easily recognisable on the ground by his closeness to the ground, his ease of recognition has also resided in his wearing of a helmet to protect his head.

The two answers

Caleb Daniel and Paul Callery.

Question 26

This former VFL footballer was born in Melbourne’s inner suburbs in the decade after the end of the Second World War. A champion rover, he was often highly fancied as a Brownlow Medal chance, but never won that award. He did, however, poll well enough over his career to just sneak into the list of the highest 25 career Brownlow Medal vote pollers of all time. Five times club best and fairest, and a captain of the club, he played more than 250 games in a career spanning well over a decade, every one of them in the number 29 guernsey.

The two answers

Garry Wilson and Kevin Bartlett.

Question 25

The journey to the answer for this question starts with a former St Kilda AFL ruckman who was born in a Tiger’n’Tom Hafey premiership year and, in addition to his career at St Kilda, also played for a team once coached by Hafey, and a second Melbourne based AFL club where he wore the number 1 guernsey. A giant of a man, 6 feet 8 inches tall, he played more than 200 VFL/AFL games in a career spanning more than 12 years. This ruckman was involved in a high profile, and subsequently culturally influential, on-field incident, where he was accused of racially abusing an indigenous footballer originally from the Northern Territory. The indigenous footballer was not going to take this rubbishing lying down, and the AFL were culturally and organisationally ready to make a stand on the issue. A mediation session took place between the giant ruckman and the racially maligned indigenous footballer, and there have been very few on-field racial taunts since then. Who was the aboriginal footballer of Northern Territorian background who was racially abused by the former St Kilda ruckman.

The two answers

Michael Long (abuser Damian Monkhorst) and Scott Chisholm (abuser Peter Everitt).

Question 24

This former AFL footballer played for two clubs, both of whom were admitted to the VFL in 1925. He was a more attacking key defender than many, often backing his own judgement, rather than focusing on negating his own direct opponent. At times questions have been raised about his temperament or discipline, but his achievements over a highly successful career were many, including club best and fairest, All Australian, three times premiership player, and winner of the late Danny Frawley’s Golden Fist Award. He retired at the age of 33.

The two answers

Brian Lake (Hawthorn and Western Bulldogs) and Josh Gibson (Hawthorn and North Melbourne)

Question 23

This former AFL champion footballer is one of the greatest indigenous players ever to have played the game. For a significant period of his life, he has lived in Adelaide. He was a talented soccer player in his youth, and he has been a social ambassador for various indigenous causes. As an AFL player, his strengths and qualities included versatility, being able to play in attack, defence or midfield and on the ball, and supreme athleticism with breath-taking run and clean sure touch, as well as longevity and durability. He played well over 300 career games, and more than 20 games per season for more than 10 consecutive seasons. He has been a two-time AFL premiership player, three times club best and fairest, four or five times All Australian, and a two-time winner of what some regard as AFL football’s highest individual honour.

The two answers

Adam Goodes and Andrew McLeod.

Question 22

This former VFL/AFL footballer was born in a Melbourne premiership year in a far remote era, an era when the footballing world order and hierarchy were different to today, and the Demons were the champion team of their era, playing in 8 Grand Finals in 11 years, for 6 premierships. The player of our question was no stranger to Grand Finals himself, playing in 4, in a career of over 150 games spanning a decade or more. He wasn’t the quickest of foot, but he compensated for this with a good football brain, sound judgement and a sure left kicking boot. In the later stages of his career, he suffered the disappointment of playing in two losing Grand Final teams in consecutive years. He died prematurely, in his fifties, while bicycling with friends in a popular coastal town, when he appeared to suffer a sudden and unexpected catastrophic coronary event.

The two answers

David O’Halloran and Paul Couch.

Question 21

This former Adelaide Crows player was born in 1971 and made his AFL debut in 1991. He played around 130 games for Adelaide in a career spanning 9 or 10 years. His career was significantly interrupted after a serious lower limb injury caused him to miss more than 30 games over 2 consecutive seasons in the mid 1990s. He was a member of the back-to-back Crows premiership teams of 1997 and 1998, and was selected in the Crows team of the decade, 1990s. He also had a short stint at Hawthorn.

The two answers

Matthew Robran and Shaun Rehn.

Question 20

This former indigenous AFL footballer was born in a non-Victorian, but traditional, Australian Rules football state and played almost 120 games in a seven-year career for Carlton. He also had a short stint at Richmond. In his post playing days, he suffered from mental health issues, problem drug use, and criminal convictions for theft and violence. He never managed to play in an AFL premiership team but, in a premiership year for his old club Richmond, he was sentenced to imprisonment for violence perpetrated under the influence of crystal methamphetamine, in a sequence of events which involved a weapon and which were said in court to have left at least one of his victims terrorised and highly traumatised.

The two answers

Chris Yarran and Justine Murphy.

Question 19

This former Geelong and North Melbourne AFL footballer played just over 100 games for the Cats in his seven years at the club between 1993 and 1999. He wore the guernsey number of another former Geelong and North Melbourne player, namely Doug Wade. He played in losing Grand Final teams in 1994 and 1995, but never tasted premiership success. His first name starts with L.

The two answers

Leigh Colbert and Liam Pickering.

Question 18

This former VFL/AFL premiership footballer played over 150 games in a career of 12 years that included a losing Grand Final as well as a winning one, and that spanned all of the 1980s, extending into the early 1990s. He would most likely have played over 200 games had he not missed much football through injury and multiple suspensions. His birthday is 16th June. In round 19 of the 1986 season, he was involved in a controversial incident featuring an ugly late to the contest round arm swinging punch to the head that saw the recipient stretchered off and the transgressor receive a three week suspension, which seemed very lenient at the time, and even more so when judged retrospectively by the standards of today.

The two answers

David Rhys-Jones and Dennis Banks.

Question 17

This talented former Melbourne VFL/AFL player was a tall forward standing close to 194cm. He came to the Demons from a Victorian town to the north west of Melbourne and had a nickname deriving from an animal. He averaged between one and two goals a game over his career, in which a highlight was a career high nine goal haul in one game. His career was savaged by injury which sadly prevented him from realising his full potential; indeed, so injury-wracked was his career that, in four of his seasons with the Demons, he managed fewer than ten games. At one time in his life, he developed difficulties with gambling, serious high end of the range problem gambling, which had a debilitating and protracted effect on the trajectory of his life but, after much pain, grief and suffering, he eventually managed to reform himself.

The two answers

David Schwarz (aka the Ox) and Robert Walters (aka Pig).

Question 16

This former champion Australian Rules footballer, an indigenous Australian of the Noongar people of the west, was born in the southern part of Western Australia at a time in Australia’s history after the infamous bodyline test cricket series in 1932/33, but before the Olympic Games came to Australia and Melbourne in 1956. A high leaping, mobile and athletic ruckman, in his playing career he played close to 250 games in the Western Australian Football League and was awarded the Sandover Medal (the WAFL award for the best and fairest player in the competition) on more than one occasion. He also won the Simpson Medal (interstate) awarded for the best player for Western Australia in an interstate football match, in his case against South Australia, plus the Tassie Medal for the best player at the now sadly defunct state of origin football carnival. He was named in both the All Australian team and the Indigenous team of the century, plus he was named captain of one of these teams. Like many Western Australian football champions in the days before the AFL, he was constantly wooed to head east and play in the VFL, in his case by more than one club, but most persistently and insistently by Geelong.

The two answers

Graham (Polly) Farmer and Stephen Michael.

Question 15

This former Geelong player, a small to mid-sized forward very good around goals, played around 250 games in a 14-season career for the Cats and his achievements include three-time premiership player, Norm Smith Medallist, and selection on multiple occasions in the AFL All Australian Team. After his 14th season at Geelong, he wanted to continue playing but the Cats ruthlessly pursued their policy of phasing out the veterans of their great 2007 to 2011 triple premiership era, and he was moved on to a club once coached by Kevin Sheedy. He managed two more seasons, and played finals football again, but in the twilight of his career he was not quite at the lofty standard of the Cat champ of yesteryear.

The two answers

Paul Chapman and Steve Johnson.

Question 14

This former Essendon AFL footballer played in the 2000 premiership team and also in the 2001 Grand Final loss to the Brisbane Lions. He also played for another AFL club, a club at which he did not experience premiership success, albeit they have been no strangers to premierships in recent years and, in 1989, played off in a classic Grand Final. In his post AFL days, he played in the Essendon District Football League and, in 2006, his team was involved in a controversial incident when East Keilor forfeited to Strathmore at half time, ostensibly because of a lack of sufficient fit players to continue the game, but possibly, or so it was alleged, to avoid their percentage taking a further second half shellacking, and so to save them from relegation to second division. He shares his first name with one member of the most famous music composing duo in popular music history and the first four letters of his surname spell a word sometimes used to describe the night-time sleeping house of animals on a farm.

The two answers

John Barnes and Paul Barnard.

Question 13

This contemporary AFL footballer was born in Victoria in 1994, drafted in 2012, and made his AFL debut in 2013. He has played close to 130 games in which he has averaged around 0.45 goals per game. A left footed kick, and prolific ball winning midfielder, he has also been used by his team either forward or across half back. His best season thus far has been 2018, when he won the club best and fairest. At one time in his career, he was disciplined and suspended after a chaotic sequence of events which involved a row or falling out with his female partner, alleged substance use, and an apparent attempt by associates from his club to assist him evade drug testing authorities.

The two answers

Lachie Hunter and Lachie Whitfield.

Question 12

This former Essendon defender played just over 200 games in a career of over ten years and was a multiple premiership player. After retiring as a player, he served as an assistant coach for several years, and eventually gained a senior AFL coaching appointment. His team didn't set the world on fire in his early coaching years, which saw three consecutive seasons where they missed the finals, but subsequent improvement with consecutive finals appearances meant that, coming into his seventh season, expectations were high. The season was a disaster, and there was widespread speculation that he would lose his job, but after an intensive end of season review, he was re-appointed, with a major overhaul of the coaching support staff and re-delegation of responsibilities within the football department. The transformation of the team was remarkable. With a more attacking and direct style of play, resulting in faster movement of the ball and more rapid transition from attack to defence, his eighth season as senior coach saw his team win the premiership. The following year, his team was raging hot favourites for the flag but faltered deep into the finals campaign, before coming back the next year to win the flag again and give the coach of our question and his team, a second premiership in three seasons.

The two answers

Damien Hardwick and Mark Thompson.

Question 11

This VFL/AFL footballer is a member of a father-son duo in which the father and son between them represented three clubs, namely Richmond, Collingwood and the Bulldogs. The father played a lot of his football in the ruck, the son a lot of his football at centre-half forward. The player of our question was born in the mid 1950s, made his debut for the Tigers in the mid 1970s, and subsequently transferred to Collingwood, during a period of several years following the defection of Tom Hafey to Collingwood from Richmond, when there was an intense mutual hostility between the clubs and they were hell-bent on poaching players each from the other.

The two answers

David Cloke (son Travis) and Allan Edwards (father Arthur).

Question 10

This former AFL coach and player stood just under six feet tall and managed over 50 games of AFL football in a career which spanned six years. His club experienced multiple premiership success in the 1980s and 1990s but he was there at the wrong time, or for not long enough or both, to be a multiple premiership player himself. He started his AFL assistant coaching career in the best possible way, with a premiership, at a team who had one of the most dominant seasons in AFL history and were a runaway ladder leader and Grand Final victor. His senior AFL coaching career did not work out so well. His first four-year foray into AFL coaching saw three consecutive completed seasons missing the finals and, when his AFL coaching career ended with a sacking, he had coached four years in which his team could finish no higher than 12th. After his AFL coaching career in Victoria finished after four years, he returned, in a coaching capacity, to the state from where he had come to Melbourne. To the sadness of the football world, he developed cancer and died prematurely.

The two answers

Dean Bailey and Ken Judge.

Question 9

This former Geelong full forward played in the number 23 jumper and his first effort of being club leading goalkicker was the first of four consecutive such achievements. He once kicked over 100 goals in a season for Geelong, and was once a Coleman Medal winner, with a home and away season goal tally in the nineties which was converted to a century of season goals in the finals. After his career at Geelong, he transferred to a club that had known little success for a great many years.

The two answers

Doug Wade and Larry Donohue.

Question 8

This former VFL/AFL player and senior coach was born in a non-Victorian traditional Australian Rules Football Australian state. He played for two clubs, both of which achieved the ultimate success in football, a premiership during his tenure as a player there, with a losing Grand Final followed by a premiership the year after. That premiership was particularly special for the club by virtue, not only of having lost the Grand Final the year before, but by being the club’s first ever flag. The player of our question played for seven years or thereabouts for the first club, and for five years for the second. Injury, loss of form and staleness in an environment are ever present perils and pitfalls for a footballer and the transfer of club seemed to refresh and regenerate him. He was a premiership player at the second club. As well as playing for more than one club, he had coaching stints at more than one club, and his coaching and playing involvements included service at St Kilda and Carlton. He has often been described as an intense or driven personality, and it has been rumoured in AFL football that he has had sexual or gender identity idiosyncrasies with a proclivity for cross dressing.

The two answers

Dean Laidley and Ian Stewart.

Question 7

This former VFL/AFL footballer, born in the 1950s, played for Collingwood, Essendon and Brisbane. He played for Collingwood from 1983 to 1986, transferring mid-season in 1986 to Essendon when the Magpies asked him to take a pay cut and, after a largely undistinguished tenure of less than a full single season at the Bombers, moved to Brisbane in 1987 where he gave three or four good seasons of service at the end of his career. A beautiful kick of a football, in his playing days he stood close to 181cm tall, tipped the scales at close to 79 kg and, in a career of more than 150 games, kicked over 100 goals. He has a first degree relative who also played VFL/AFL football.

The two answers

Geoff Raines and Michael Richardson.

Question 6

This former AFL champion footballer has a relative who played VFL/AFL football with the Tigers. Originally from Tasmania, he was a great mark and goalkicker too, although sometimes a little shaky and somewhat inconsistent with his set shot kicking. He played most of his career as a key forward and four times managed 60 or more goals in a season, including season tallies of 65 and 67 goals. But with a great aerobic capacity for a tall, a 'big engine' as they like to say, he was moved to the wing for the latter part of his playing career with great effect and, at close to 194cm, he could match smaller opponents with speed and gut running, while outpointing them in the air. He suffered from knee and hamstring injuries at different times, but in a career played in its entirety in the number 12 guernsey, he played more than 250 AFL games and kicked more than 700 goals. In his post playing days he moved into the media.

The two answers

Matthew Richardson and Nick Riewoldt.

Question 5

This present-day AFL player was drafted in 2004 and made his AFL debut in 2005. Like Chris Judd, Luke Hodge and Dustin Martin, he was a top three draft pick, and has been All Australian and a two time club best and fairest, but his career never quite reached the illustrious heights of those three champions. Versatile, and a strong mark for his height, he has played midfield, forward and back. He suffered from a knee injury early in his career but at his first club didn’t miss too much football and played more than 200 games for the club, and more than 250 games overall. Late in his career, after a turbulent season at his club, where the coach’s job seemed to be in jeopardy and the team was under-performing, he moved to Sydney transferring to the GWS Giants, whereupon he suffered the frustration of seeing his longstanding under-performing former Melbourne-based AFL club make immediate and dramatic improvement and win a premiership. His 2017 season, like that of his club, was ravaged by injury and he missed more than 15 consecutive games, with a soft tissue injury that would suffer recurrence and further setbacks each time it looked like he was improving and he might be near to getting back on the field. He is now retired.

The two answers

Brett Deledio (Richmond then GWS) and Ryan Griffen (Western Bulldogs then GWS).

Question 4

This AFL footballer, a left footed forward with a good and mostly accurate kick, spent part of his youth in the United Kingdom. He has played his entire AFL career, of well over 200 games and well over 300 goals, in the number 18 guernsey, and also played in the 2000 AFL Grand Final. In the early stage of his career, he was regarded as scrupulously fair and perhaps even a soft pretty boy, but he later toughened up and consciously brought a harder edge to his game. In the twilight of his playing career, he served as club captain, but this was not a successful or harmonious period for the club, and he did not, for all of this time as skipper, seem entirely in accord, 'on the same page' or 'singing from the same hymn book' with the coach and management about his role in the team. Various questions surrounded his leadership style, his relationship with his coach and whether he should be playing near goals or further up the ground. The coach in question was eventually sacked in controversial circumstances amidst accusations of conspiracy, skulduggery and secret back room machinations.

The two answers

Brad Green of Melbourne and Matthew Lloyd of Essendon.

Question 3

This former AFL player has been involved in coaching roles at Essendon and Melbourne. Late in the 2011 AFL season, he was appointed as senior coach for the 2012 season, for an AFL team which played in the 1954 Grand Final, but which hadn't had much success since the 1950s and early 60s. He wasn't exactly a household name as a player and came to his senior AFL coach position firstly through coaching in the Bellarine League where he coached Ocean Grove to four consecutive premierships, and then subsequently from an assistant coaching role at an AFL club where he was part of premiership success.

The two answers

Brendan McCartney and Mark Neeld. Coincidentally, they were both appointed as senior coaches (to the Bulldogs and Demons respectively) in the same week at the end of the 2011 season.

Question 2

This former Collingwood footballer played over 150 VFL games and played for the Magpies in two losing VFL Grand Finals. His brother also played for Collingwood, in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, and was a member of the 1958 Collingwood premiership team. Although both brothers had successful careers, and played more than 250 games between them, the player of our quiz question never played with his brother for Collingwood, the brothers’ birthdates being separated by more than a decade, and their VFL careers not overlapping at all. If we allow given names to be given in their shortened familiar form, his initials contain the letters B and R.

The two answers

Bob Rose (brother Kevin Rose) and Ross Brewer (brother Ian Brewer).

Question 1

This 2012 Sydney premiership player has a brother who was a premiership player at Collingwood. In the 2012 Grand Final against Hawthorn, he became the second premiership player in the immediate family, while his brother raucously barracked from the stands, for the team who just a week earlier had defeated the Magpies and ended his opportunity to play in the 2012 Grand Final.

The two answers

Heath & Rhyce Shaw and Ben & Sam Reid.