By Jake Niall
Former West Coast champion and skipper Ben Cousins will not be inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 2024 and is not considered likely to be added to the honour roll any time soon.
While the question has been asked about whether it is time for Cousins to be accepted as a member of the hall of fame, the committee has not seriously debated Cousins as a prospective member, in part due to his conviction for stalking his ex-partner, which saw him spend seven months in jail in 2020.
Ben Cousins now has a role with Channel Seven.Credit: Getty Images
The hall of fame will induct several new members next month, headed by the elevation of former Hawthorn full-forward Jason Dunstall to Legend status. Character is a consideration for inductees and the hall of fame recently changed its rules to allow for inductees to be removed or suspended from the hall of fame – a change that was made when Barry Cable, then a Legend of the game, was found to have sexually abused a child by a civil court.
But sources familiar with the hall of fame’s position on Cousins said he was not under consideration even before the AFL took a stand on violence against women by having a moment’s silence and players, coaches and umpires linking arms on the weekend. The AFL’s deliberations, via the committee and input into those decisions, are strictly confidential.
Cousins won the 2005 Brownlow Medal.Credit: Getty Images
Cousins has been employed by Channel Seven reading the sports news in Perth and is slated to appear on Seven’s Dancing with the Stars, having previously worked part-time at his former club, the Eagles, who have been pleased to see him showing signs of good health following his longstanding battles with drug abuse.
Cousins retired from the AFL in 2010, following two years at Richmond. As a six-time All-Australian, Brownlow medallist (2005), AFL Players Association most valuable player (2005) and premiership player, he would be a certain inclusion if not for his off-field blemishes.
Cousins, like all players, would be eligible five years after his retirement and he would have gone in almost as soon as he was eligible, if not for his behavioural issues.
While West Coast have not officially nominated Cousins to be in the hall of fame – clubs can nominate their players and coaches, though this is not mandatory to be inducted – the club’s chairman, Paul Fitzpatrick, expressed the view that Cousins should be inducted in an ABC radio interview on Saturday.
AFL CEO Andrew Dillon.Credit: Eddie Jim
An AFL spokesman said the league did not discuss hall of fame decisions or deliberations, other than the elevation of Dunstall.
At the announcement for Dunstall’s elevation in April, AFL chairman Richard Goyder, who is on the hall of fame committee, said: “I won’t talk about hall of fame. I will say it’s a joy to see Ben in the shape he’s in right now, and I’ve seen a fair bit of him in the west.
“I think [Cousins’ recovery] is fantastic … what I would say with hall of fame, and it’s almost my precursor to our committee discussions each year, is it’s not who’s in, it’s who’s not in.
“It’s an incredibly high bar to be a hall of famer in the AFL, and it’s even higher to be a Legend, so we’ll look at these things in due course.”
The news that Cousins will not be added to the hall of fame comes after the AFL and its clubs took a league-wide stance against family violence over the weekend, and after the AFL intervened to block former North Melbourne champion Wayne Carey from being elevated as a Legend into the NSW Australian Football Hall of Fame.
The AFL only learned on Thursday that Carey, who was born in Wagga Wagga, was to be inducted as a Legend at a function to be held at the SCG the following night.
Players from Adelaide and Port Adelaide link arms on Thursday night.Credit: AFL Photos
“We didn’t think it was the right decision,” said AFL CEO Andrew Dillon. “I called Wayne Carey earlier this morning to inform him of this and he agreed that being made a Legend would take away from the event and the important focus on the national response to the issue of gender-based violence against women.”
Carey, according to the AFL, was understanding of the decision and did not attend the function so as not to distract from those who were recognised.
Carey, inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 2010, was also one of the 100 inaugural inductees into the NSW hall of fame announced in March by AFL NSW/ACT head Tiffany Robertson.
Carey, a former football columnist for The Age, pleaded guilty to indecent assault after grabbing a woman’s breast in 1995. The woman filed a civil suit against him, which was settled out of court.
He was arrested in the US in 2007 and charged with assaulting a female police officer in 2007 after his then-girlfriend, Kate Neilson, accused him of smashing a wine glass against her face. He pleaded guilty to assaulting and resisting Miami police but escaped conviction. Neilson did not press charges.
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