Morrish Medal

The Morrish Medal was first inaugurated in 1947, the year after the formation of the Victorian Football League's thirds competition.^[1] Named in honour of reserve grade treasurer Tom Morrish, who had held the position since 1922, the medal was to be awarded to the best-performing player across the season as adjudged by the field umpires.^[2] This continued throughout the history of the League's thirds, which was renamed to the under-19s in 1960. When the under-19s competition was wound up at the conclusion of the 1991 Australian Football League season, to be replaced by the new Victorian State Football League under-18s competition, the decision was made to continue awarding the Morrish Medal.

In the style of the Brownlow Medal and Gardiner Medal medals already awarded in the seniors and seconds competitions respectively, the presiding field umpire would cast a 3–2–1 vote at the conclusion of each match. The player with the most votes tallied following the end of the home-and-away season would then be presented with the medal. The initial voting method continues to this day, albeit with multiple field umpires now conferring to present a single set of votes for each match.

Until 1981, a count back rule identical to that of the Brownlow was used to split winners based on the amount of three-vote games they were awarded, followed by two-vote games, etc. until a solitary winner could be found.^[3] In 1992, the League recognised three players who initially lost by count back – Jim McGowan (1961), Phillip Friedman (1974) and Jack Dinatale (1976) – and awarded them retrospective medals.^[4]

A player guilty of an offence deemed worthy of a suspension is ineligible to win the Morrish Medal.