\n Josh Dunkley has won his first Brisbane B&F ahead of star midfield mates\n <\/p>\n
Josh Dunkley after the Grand Final between Brisbane and Geelong at Melbourne Cricket Ground on September 27, 2025. Picture: AFL Photos<\/p>\n
JOSH Dunkley has won his first Merrett-Murray Medal as Brisbane’s best and fairest player for 2025 on Thursday night.<\/p>\n
The triple-premiership midfielder polled 79 votes to edge out fellow vice-captain Hugh McCluggage (75) and two-time Norm Smith Medal winner Will Ashcroft (71).<\/p>\n
Co-captain Harris Andrews was fourth (70) in the club’s back-to-back premiership campaign.<\/p>\n
The gong caps a brilliant season for Dunkley, who was named in the 44-strong All-Australian squad and was also announced as the AFLPA Most Courageous Player.<\/p>\n
Josh Dunkley with coach Chris Fagan after the Grand Final between Brisbane and Geelong at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on September 27, 2025. Picture: AFL Photos<\/p>\n
Coach Chris Fagan described the 28-year-old as the best defensive midfielder he’s ever seen earlier this year, averaging 25 disposals and eight tackles a game in a show of his two-way attitude.<\/p>\n
“Most midfielders are good at winning the ball, but Josh combines this ability with a hunger to attack the defensive side of the game that I have rarely seen,” Fagan said.<\/p>\n
“He constantly leads the team in tackles and defensive acts and has everyone’s respect and admiration.<\/p>\n
“He cares deeply about team performance and culture, he’s always looking for ways to help others and if he thinks something needs attention, he will always let the coaches know.<\/p>\n
“It is no mistake we’ve played in three Grand Finals since he arrived at the club.”<\/p>\n
Hugh McCluggage celebrates a goal for Brisbane against Geelong in the 2025 Toyota Grand Final. Picture: AFL Photos<\/p>\n
In finishing runner-up, McCluggage stood on the podium for a sixth time without having won the top award.<\/p>\n
Young half-backs Jaspa Fletcher and Darcy Wilmot rounded out the top five in just their third and fourth seasons respectively.<\/p>\n
Top 10 Merrett-Murray Medal<\/p>\n
1. Josh Dunkley – 79 votes
2. Hugh McCluggage – 75
3. Will Ashcroft – 71
4. Harris Andrews – 70
=5. Jaspa Fletcher – 64
=5. Darcy Wilmot – 64
=7. Dayne Zorko – 61
=7. Zac Bailey – 61
9. Cam Rayner – 60
10. Jarrod Berry – 54<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Josh Dunkley has won his first Brisbane B&F ahead of star midfield mates Josh Dunkley after the Grand…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":185182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-185181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-text"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}