Jason Dunstall
Encyclopedia
Jason Hadfield Dunstall (born 14 August 1964) is a former Australian rules football
Australian rules football
Australian rules football, officially known as Australian football, also called football, Aussie rules or footy is a sport played between two teams of 22 players on either...

 player for the Hawthorn Football Club
Hawthorn Football Club
The Hawthorn Football Club, nicknamed the Hawks, is a professional Australian rules football club in the Australian Football League . The club, founded in 1902, is the youngest of the Victorian-based teams in the AFL. The team play in Brown & Gold vertically striped guernseys...

 of the AFL
Australian Football League
The Australian Football League is both the governing body and the major professional competition in the sport of Australian rules football...

. He is the third greatest
AFL All-time Goalkicking records
The following is a listing of the highest all-time goalkickers in the Australian Football League . Players who have kicked 500 goals or more are listed. Includes only goals kicked in the home and away season and finals...

 goalkicker in the history of the VFL/AFL. Dunstall is regarded as one of the greatest full-forward
Full-forward
Full-forward is a position in Australian rules football and Gaelic football with a key focus on kicking goals.Leading full-forwards of the Australian Football League are usually among those awarded with the Coleman Medal for the most goals in an AFL season....

s to have ever played, kicking 1254 goals, a feat only exceeded by Tony Lockett
Tony Lockett
Anthony Howard "Tony" Lockett is a former Australian rules football player. Lockett is the highest goal scorer in the history of the VFL/AFL with 1,360 goals in a career of 281 games, that commenced in 1983 with the St Kilda Football Club, and finished in 2002 with the Sydney Swans...

 with 1360 and Gordon Coventry
Gordon Coventry
Gordon "Nuts" Coventry was an Australian rules footballer who played for Collingwood Football Club in the Victorian Football League . With 1,299 goals over 18 seasons, Coventry remains one of the greatest full forwards the game has ever seen...

 with 1299. He is widely regarded the greatest Queensland born player of all time.

Early life

Dunstall was born and grew up in Brisbane. He attended the Anglican Church Grammar School
Anglican Church Grammar School
The Anglican Church Grammar School , is an independent, Anglican, day and boarding school for boys, located in East Brisbane, an inner suburb of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.Founded in 1912 by Canon William Perry French Morris, Churchie has a non-selective...

 from 1977–1981. At school he played soccer as a goalkeeper and also rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

.

His junior football was spent playing with the Coorparoo Football Club in the then Queensland Australian Football League
Queensland Australian Football League
The Queensland Australian Football League was an Australian rules football competition for clubs from South East Queensland.Up until 2010, the QAFL was the premier semi-professional competition in Queensland, with salary cap rules and regulations in place.It was previously known as the Queensland...

.

VFL/AFL career

Dunstall was recruited by the Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

-based Hawthorn Football Club
Hawthorn Football Club
The Hawthorn Football Club, nicknamed the Hawks, is a professional Australian rules football club in the Australian Football League . The club, founded in 1902, is the youngest of the Victorian-based teams in the AFL. The team play in Brown & Gold vertically striped guernseys...

 who were looking for a "stay at home" type full-forward and he made his VFL/AFL debut in the league in 1985.

Nicknamed Piggy due to his stocky physique, Jason Dunstall took no time to start kicking goals for the club. He kicked 100 goals in a season a record six times and won the Coleman Medal
Coleman Medal
The Coleman Medal is awarded yearly to the Australian Football League player who kicks the most goals in regular-season matches in that year...

 in 1988, 1989 and 1992. In May 1992, he kicked a career best of 17 goals in a game against the Richmond Football Club
Richmond Football Club
The Richmond Football Club, nicknamed The Tigers, is an Australian rules football club which competes in the Australian Football League. Richmond shares healthy rivalries with Carlton, Collingwood and Essendon. After winning five premierships between 1967 and 1980, the club hit the depths in 1990,...

, just one goal short of the all time record.

At 188 cm, Dunstall was not an overly tall full-forward
Full-forward
Full-forward is a position in Australian rules football and Gaelic football with a key focus on kicking goals.Leading full-forwards of the Australian Football League are usually among those awarded with the Coleman Medal for the most goals in an AFL season....

 and was not known for taking overhead mark
Mark (Australian football)
A mark is a skill in Australian rules football where a player cleanly catches a kicked ball that has travelled more than 15 metres without anyone else touching it or the ball hitting the ground....

s. Instead, he often used his explosive pace off the mark to lead into space, which enabled him to take trademark chest marks and diving marks. Other times, he used his stocky 100+ kilogram frame to outbody opponents.

Dunstall had an extremely high accuracy in kicking goals from set shots. These techniques, as well as his ability to shrug tackles and snap goals more than made up for his lack of height.

One of the most admired aspects of Dunstall's play was not only his own prolific scoring rate, but also his capacity to set up or unselfishly assist goals by handing the ball off to team mates in better position – handpassing, or shepherding and using his body well to position other players, on some regular basis, to also score goals. This capacity to contribute to the team's overall performance and its victory via both – the efforts of his own personal boot and that of other team mates kicking goals partly from his assistance to them – made him one of the greatest full-forwards to ever pull on a boot.

Dunstall played in premiership sides in 1986, 1988, 1989 and 1991. He also played in five night premierships. From 1995–98, he captained the Hawks. Dunstall narrowly missed winning the prestigious Brownlow Medal
Brownlow Medal
The Chas Brownlow Trophy, better known as the Brownlow Medal , is awarded to the "fairest and best" player in the Australian Football League during the regular season as determined by votes cast by the officiating field umpires after each game...

 on several occasions, twice finishing second, and twice third in voting (Tony Lockett
Tony Lockett
Anthony Howard "Tony" Lockett is a former Australian rules football player. Lockett is the highest goal scorer in the history of the VFL/AFL with 1,360 goals in a career of 281 games, that commenced in 1983 with the St Kilda Football Club, and finished in 2002 with the Sydney Swans...

 is the only player of Dunstall's field position to have won the medal). Dunstall was renowned for being a fair player and despite his intimidating size in an era when the game was notorious for behind-the-play incidents, he was well respected by umpires
Umpire (Australian rules football)
An umpire is an official in the sport of Australian rules football.-Origins:Unlike many other codes of football, where the official is called a referee, in Australian Football, the officials borrow their title from the game of cricket, which is played on the same types of fields and was an...

.

Dunstall qualified for the prestigious All-Australian side in 1992 and 1994, and was also part of the Hawthorn Team of the Century. He retired at the end of season 1998 after 269 games.

Post-football

Dunstall has been guest commentator on the Seven Network
Seven Network
The Seven Network is an Australian television network owned by Seven West Media Limited. It dates back to 4 November 1956, when the first stations on the VHF7 frequency were established in Melbourne and Sydney.It is currently the second largest network in the country in terms of population reach...

 and radio station 3AW
3AW
3AW is a talkback radio station in Melbourne, Australia on 693 kHz AM. It began transmission on 22 February 1932 as Melbourne's fifth commercial radio station.-History:...

 and was a regular panellist in the early days of The Footy Show
The AFL Footy Show
The Footy Show is a Logie Award winning Australian sports television program, shown on the Nine Network and its affiliates.This show, which is dedicated to the AFL and Australian rules football, made its debut on 24 March 1994 at the same time as the other version which relates to the NRL and rugby...

.

In 2004 Dunstall held the position of interim CEO at Hawthorn, and currently works on radio station Triple M
Triple M
The Triple M Network is an active rock radio network in Australia owned by media company Austereo, who also own the Today Network.- History :...

 as a commentator. His stint as CEO led to the nickname of "The Chief". His mannerisms on Fox Footy and Triple M lean towards professionalism, which at times can be seen as too serious (as on the 80's Heritage Round episode of The AFL Footy Show on 20 July 2006.) He is the focus on continual baiting by his Triple M co-commentators and is nicknamed "The Ugandan National Symbol" for his gorilla-like style, attitude and demeanour. These gorilla references have crept into The Footy Show, where both fans and Sam Newman repeatably bait him with video clips and props. In September 2008 The Footy Show launched a competition called "The Great Chief Chase" in which viewers can win prizes when they submit photos of themselves with Dunstall, making reference to the Chief's apparent submissive personality. Newman told viewers "not to take no for an answer" and gave out street references for Dunstall's local golf course.

Dunstall has also hosted various television shows, including Channel 7
Seven Network
The Seven Network is an Australian television network owned by Seven West Media Limited. It dates back to 4 November 1956, when the first stations on the VHF7 frequency were established in Melbourne and Sydney.It is currently the second largest network in the country in terms of population reach...

's Live and Kicking, Fox Footy
Fox Footy
Fox Footy is an upcoming Australian Rules football subscription television channel dedicated to screening Australian rules football matches and related programming. It will be owned by Premier Media Group, operated out of their Melbourne based studios and available on Foxtel, Austar and Optus...

's Saturday Central (with Wayne Carey
Wayne Carey
Wayne Carey is a former Australian rules footballer who played with the North Melbourne and Adelaide Football Clubs in the Australian Football League ....

), On the Couch
On the Couch
On the Couch is an Australian television program focusing on the current issues in the Australian Football League. From its debut in 2002 through to 2006, it was shown on the now defunct Fox Footy Channel. Since then it has been broadcast on Fox Sports....

and League Teams. He was a host of Triple M radio show The Gospel with Nathan Brown
Nathan G. Brown
Nathan Gordon Brown is a former Australian rules footballer for the Richmond and the Western Bulldogs in the AFL...

, Peter Everitt
Peter Everitt
Peter "Spida" Everitt is a former Australian rules footballer who played for St Kilda, Hawthorn Hawks and the Sydney Swans in the AFL. He made his debut for St Kilda in 1993 and in 2003 began playing for Hawthorn. Everitt was traded to the Sydney Swans at the end of 2006. Following the club's 2008...

 and Nick Riewoldt
Nick Riewoldt
Nick Riewoldt is an Australian rules footballer who is the current captain of the St Kilda Football Club in the Australian Football League . He was the first draft selection in the 2000 AFL Draft.-Early life:...

 until 2006.

He is currently the co-host of The Dead Set Legends alongside Andrew Gaze
Andrew Gaze
Andrew Barry Casson Gaze is Australia's best known basketball player, and one of its most successful. He is considered as the greatest player in the history of the NBL....

 on Saturday mornings on the Triple M Melbourne radio station. Dunstall is also the host of Before the Bounce, a weekly football show broadcast on Foxtel
Foxtel
Foxtel is an Australian pay television company, operating cable, direct broadcast satellite television and IPTV services. It was formed in 1995 through a joint venture established between Telstra and News Corporation....

.

Reflecting his Queensland upbringing, Dunstall is depicted lining up for goal wearing a Queensland state guernsey in Jamie Cooper's painting the Game That Made Australia, commissioned by the AFL in 2008 to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the sport.

A stand at the Cooparoo oval and the schoolboys competition in Brisbane (Jason Dunstall Cup) are both named after him.

Career Highlights

  • Hawthorn Premiership Team 1986, 1988, 1989, 1991
  • All-Australian
    All-Australian Team
    The All-Australian Team is an all star team of Australian rules footballers, selected by a panel at the end of each season. It represents a complete team, including interchange players and a coach, of the best performed during the season....

     1992, 1994
  • Coleman Medal
    Coleman Medal
    The Coleman Medal is awarded yearly to the Australian Football League player who kicks the most goals in regular-season matches in that year...

     1988, 1989, 1992
  • Hawthorn Team of the Century
  • Australian Football Hall of Fame
    Australian Football Hall of Fame
    The Australian Football Hall of Fame was established in 1996, the Centenary year of the Australian Football League, to help recognise the contributions made to the sport of Australian rules football by players, umpires, media personalities, coaches and administrators. It was initially established...

     Inductee 2002
  • Peter Crimmins Medal
    Peter Crimmins Medal
    The Peter Crimmins Medal is an Australian rules football award given to the player from the Hawthorn Football Club deemed best and fairest for the season.Peter Crimmins was a rover for Hawthorn, playing 1966-1975...

     1988, 1989, 1992, 1993
  • Hawthorn Leading Goalkicker 1986–1996, 1998
  • Hawthorn Captain 1995–1998
  • Represented both Victoria and the All-Stars in State of Origin
    State of Origin
    State of Origin is the name used in Australia for one existing sporting event which involves domestic representative teams. The term, when used in isolation, usually refers to rugby league football, and occassionally Australian Football matches, in which players are selected for the Australian...

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK