Just who is Carlton’s greatest player? It’s a question that has forever and a day provoked heated discussion amongst any Blue believers blessed with an opinion.
And in this the 150th anniversary of its hallowed existence, the Carlton Football Club has seen fit to settle the debate by naming Numero Uno and the cream de la crème of its senior playing ranks – the top 12 Carlton players of all time – in order of merit.
Number 10: Greg Williams
It took a tick over 30 years for a Carlton player to secure the club’s third Brownlow Medal. That player was the prodigiously talented and uncompromising centreman Greg Williams, and to think he was twice rejected by the club because he lacked leg speed.
A joint Medallist at Sydney in 1986, Williams took out the ’94 Brownlow with 30 votes (including nine 3s) - the highest number of votes to take out any count under the 3-2-1 system since South Melbourne’s Herbie Matthews with 32 in 1940.
Few players have impacted more in 109 matches over six seasons than the “Diesel”, who fittingly earned a Norm Smith and Premiership bauble for his troubles on his 32nd birthday – Grand Final day 1995.