{"id":430273,"date":"2026-01-22T16:03:33","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T16:03:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/430273\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T16:03:33","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T16:03:33","slug":"captains-revealed-for-afl-origin-afl-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/430273\/","title":{"rendered":"Captains revealed for AFL Origin – AFL News"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

The AFL<\/a> has announced that Western Bulldogs<\/a> superstar Marcus Bontempelli<\/a> and dual Brownlow medallist Patrick Cripps<\/a> have been appointed as the captains for the 2026 AFL Origin<\/a> fixture.<\/p>\n

Bontempelli will don the ‘C’ next to his name for Victoria, while Patrick Cripps<\/a> will lead out his native state of Western Australia.<\/p>\n

It’s perhaps an unsurprising selection, given that Bontempelli was the first player officially announced to rep the Big V guernsey, while similarly Cripps was the first revealed player to be wearing the Black Swan in the historic return of best-on-best Aussie Rules football.<\/p>\n

The honours bolster the pair’s elite AFL<\/a> accomplishments further, with Bontempelli leading the Bulldogs as captain since 2020, and Cripps leading Carlton as lone-skipper since 2022, though he shared co-captain duties with recently retired Blues star Sam Docherty<\/a> from 2019 to 2021.<\/p>\n

“Pulling on the Big V has always been a huge honour, and to be given the opportunity to captain Victoria is something I’ll cherish,” Bontempelli said in the AFL’s statement.<\/p>\n

“There’s a deep history and pride that comes with representing your state, and I’m looking forward to leading some of Victoria’s best footballers on February 14.”<\/p>\n

“To be named captain of Western Australia is incredibly special,” Cripps said.<\/p>\n

“Representing the state means a lot to me, and I can’t wait to lead the team out at Optus Stadium in front of our home crowd and hopefully make them proud.”<\/p>\n

RELATED: A<\/a>FL Origin Squads Tracker, Predicted Lineups<\/a><\/p>\n

AFL<\/a>\u00a0Origin’s clash between Victoria and Western Australia will take place on February 14th at Optus Stadium, with the first bounce scheduled for 4:40pm\/7:40pm (AWST\/AEDT).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The AFL has announced that Western Bulldogs superstar Marcus Bontempelli and dual Brownlow medallist Patrick Cripps have been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":332522,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-430273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430273","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=430273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/430273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/332522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=430273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=430273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=430273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}