AFL Townsville Top 100 Players of 2024: Complete rankings

For the third time in three seasons a midfielder from Hermit Park’s women’s team has claimed the No.1 position on the Townsville Bulletin’s annual Top 100 AFL player rankings list.

AFL Townsville Top 100 of 2024. Pictured L-R: Mitchell Dennis, Joel Newman, Hayley Cornish

For the third time in three seasons a midfielder from Hermit Park’s women’s team has claimed the coveted No.1 position on the Townsville Bulletin’s annual Top 100 AFL player rankings list.

Former Tigers premiership-winning captain Hayley Cornish returned to the district after two years interstate to lead Hermit Park to another Senior Women’s flag in 2024.

In doing so Cornish has followed in the footsteps of former teammates Alyssa Whiley (2022) and Emily Harding (2023) to claim the Bulletin’s top honour.

While the league’s best-and-fairest medal is awarded solely by the umpires, the Bulletin Top 100 uses a mathematical equation to weigh the perspectives of local coaches, umpires, district officials and representative selectors to generate a numerical value for every Senior Men’s and Women’s player in Townsville.

Cornish collected a league-high 15 best player nominations in 16 games and finished third in best-and-fairest voting in the women’s league.

Hermit Park Tigers midfielder Hayley Cornish has returned from two years interstate to claim first place in the Townsville Bulletin's annual Top 100 footballers of 2024. Picture: Shae Beplate.

She earned guernseys in the team of the season and the North Queensland representative wider training squad to pip Olivia Meagher of Thuringowa in the tightest Top 100 race yet.

Cornish said she returned to Townsville hoping to give back to the local football community by sharing skills learned across the country.

Cornish played for Coorparoo in Queensland’s QAFLW before being posted to Townsville with the military in 2020-21, then joined Norwood in South Australia’s elite state league in 2022-23.

Hermit Park Tigers midfielder Hayley Cornish has returned from two years interstate to claim first place in the Townsville Bulletin's annual Top 100 footballers of 2024. Picture: Shae Beplate.

She said Townsville had been her first preference for her next posting and was delighted to receive the chance to return to her beloved Tigers in 2024.

Cornish said she was honoured to receive the Bulletin accolade having spotted her teammates Whiley and Harding win in previous seasons.

“It’s a huge honour, thank you very much,” she said.

“I’ve spent the last two years down in Adelaide so to come back into Townsville football and have the season we did, including winning the grand final, it’s been a great and successful year.

“I went down to Adelaide with a lot of football knowledge but I really improved my skills down there. Playing and training alongside people with so much experience definitely benefited my own game. I was able to bring that up here and impact that knowledge on the girls in Townsville.

“I was lucky enough to get posted back here and I approached Hermit Park straight away to play for them again.

“It was a bit of a learning curve adapting from the level I played in Adelaide to coming back to local level football. My way of overcoming that was reminding myself to work with everybody to try and improve little parts of their game and take everybody under my wing and try to impart the knowledge I was so fortunate to get in state league programs.

“Some of the girls were in their first year of football so helping them improve their skills has been something I probably enjoyed the most.”

While Harding and Whiley both left Townsville to test themselves in higher leagues after winning the Bulletin award, Cornish said those days were now behind her and she planned to feature for Hermit Park for many years to come.

“As I get older I think I may settle here for several more years and enjoy the atmosphere we’ve created at Hermit Park. You won’t see me heading south in the next few years - I’m very excited to go back-to-back-to-back with Hermit Park.”

Originally published as AFL Townsville Top 100 Players of 2024: Complete rankings