The last player to win a Brownlow Medal at Richmond – Australian Football Hall of Fame Legend – Ian Stewart – has given his resounding approval to current-day Tiger star Dustin Martin.
Stewart, who also won two Brownlow Medals with St Kilda, was selected as the centreman in the AFL’s Team of the Century, and named on the bench in Richmond’s Team of the Century, despite playing just 78 games for the Club, is an unabashed fan of the way Martin goes about his football.
“I can see somebody who played senior football at 15 and 16 at Castlemaine, who has a low centre of gravity, so he’s hard to unbalance, and who grew up in an environment where he had to fight for everything he earned. You see that coming out in him,” Stewart told the ‘Herald Sun’.
“He is a fighter and if something has to be done, he seems to be able to lift to do it.
“That could come down to playing senior footy early; it would have been tough to play at 15 against men.”
Martin, who was Richmond’s first pick (No. 3 overall) in the 2009 AFL National Draft, has played 107 games and kicked 117 goals since debuting in 2010.
After finishing second in the Tigers’ Best and Fairest last year, Martin has taken his game to an even higher level this season.
He is averaging 25.3 disposals per game, is ranked second in the competition for total kicks (365) and is second on the goalkicking list at Richmond with 27 goals.
