How unselfish goal kicker Jason Dunstall become an Australian Football Legend

Former teammates and greats of Hawthorn reflect on the career of Jason Dunstall as the champion goalkicker earns legend status in the Australian Football Hall of Fame.

Gary Ayres remembers the day the boys were filthy with Jason Dunstall.

It was in 1985 when the man who would become one of only six players to boot more than 1000 AFL goals was struggling to keep up on a long-distance run around Melbourne’s eastern suburbs.

For as explosive and athletic as the champion spearhead would become in the forward 50m, endurance wasn’t Dunstall’s thing early on.

So when the rest of the group returned to Wattle Park from the 10km trek, Ayres said one player was missing.

“It was Dunstall, and our reserves coach at the time Des Meagher said the rest of us had to just keep running until Jason arrived,” Ayres said.

Jason Dunstall will be elevated to legend status. Picture: Jake Nowakowski

“It took him a fair while to return because he wasn’t the greatest long-distance runner.

“He said he got lost, in the end. But fair to say he didn’t get the warmest reception from the group.”

Whether the Queenslander genuinely lost his way or slowed to a walk is a story to clarify when the four-time premiership player, three-time Coleman Medallist and 12-time leading goal kicker becomes only the 32nd player to be indicted as a Legend at the Australian Football Hall of Fame gala dinner in June.

Plenty of people have poked fun at his stocky figure over the journey including the legendary coach Allan Jeans who once helped retrieve a group of four Hawthorn players from a police station on an end-of-season trip gone wrong in Miami.

Jeans said the police officer could “shoot him, shoot him and shoot him” referring to his three teammates, but not “the fat bloke in the middle”, as Dunstall recalled.

But for all the ribbing, Dunstall will be celebrated as not only one of the smartest, accurate and most unselfish spearheads in the game, but also one of its most powerful and athletic.

“He could throw himself sideways in the air almost like he was taking a slips catch in cricket,” former captain Ayres said.

“He could manoeuvre his body in a way so that even if the kick wasn’t perfect for him he could angle his body and hold the defender out so he protected the drop zone.

“He was acrobatic on the lead, he really was.

“And he made it look easy. He was extraordinary.

“I’m not sure he left the 50m that often and we joke about it, but you were always really confident kicking him the ball because even if it was a bit off he somehow made it work.

“His connection and understanding with his players up field was first rate so his timing and adjustments just meant he was incredibly hard to stop.”

Ben Dixon received Dunstall’s revered No. 19 jersey when he retired in 1998, saying the moment Dunstall offered it up Dixon “whipped it out of his hands before he could finish the sentence. Just the honour in it”.

Dixon said Dunstall was by far the fastest and most team-oriented full forward up the top of the AFL’s goal kicker leaderboards.

He is one of only six players to pass the magical 1000 mark with 1254 majors from 269 games.

“He defied physics with his speed. He was Usain Bolt in a Hawthorn jumper,” Dixon said.

“He was the fastest player over 20m that I ever saw at Hawthorn and I was blown away by how powerful he was.

Jason Dunstall was very quick off the mark on the lead. Picture: Nicholas Wilson

“He was a steam train and you didn’t want to be anywhere on the tracks when he was coming through.

“But the thing people maybe underestimate was how unselfish he was.

“He really was the most unselfish footballer I have seen. He could have kicked many more goals.

“What he gave off was extraordinary and his chasing and tackling was phenomenal.

“That is what separates him from the other guys to kick more than 1000 in my view.”

Dunstall, who turns 60 in August, kicked 100 goals in a season six times, including a haul of 17 majors in 1992 in a 79-point win over Richmond in Round 7 at Waverley.

In that contest he fell one goal short of equalling Fred Fanning’s AFL/VFL record 18-goals in a game for Melbourne, despite the Hawks’ best attempts to feed him the footy, Ayres said.

He kicked a career-high 145 goals that incredible season.

“You watch some of the vision from the last quarter, every player forward of centre was trying to get him the ball at all different angles so he could break the record,” Ayres said.

“Amazing to think some sides struggle to kick that many goals in a game, and he did it by himself.”

Former Richmond captain Wayne Campbell had 38 touches that day and said he was in awe of the Hawks and their superstar spearhead who racked up 18 marks and 29 disposals.

Dunstall and teammates celebrate the 1986 premiership. Picture:Tony Feder/ALLSPORT

“Yabby Jeans was coaching us by then and he was shuffling the Hawthorn magnets around on the board before the game I think wishing he was still coaching them,” Campbell said.

“It was a thing of beauty the way that they kicked the ball to him because it was traditional full forward stuff. He would lead out from the goal square and he would mark it on his chest.

“They were obviously on a different level to us, and it was embarrassing that he kicked so many goals on us, but in a way it was good to watch.

“And he was a very humble, selfless team player, because he would tackle and chase as well, and an absolute superstar of the game.”

Dunstall was renowned as one of the sharpest shooters in footy, nailing 1254 majors and 641 behinds, at an average of 4.66 a game.

Dixon said Dunstall would get booted off the training track at night he worked on his goal kicking so hard throughout the week.

“He was a beautiful kick, but that is because he did an absolute truckload of work on it,” Dixon said.

“The property manager Andy Angwin (who nicknamed Dermott Brereton “The Kid”) used to turn the lights out (at Glenferrie Oval) because he had to go home to his wife and “Chief” would want to keep having more set shots.

“So we would still be going in the dark, going off the street lights on Linda Crescent.”

Dunstall also played a crucial role for the Hawks off the field as a director and interim chief executive, having helped hand pick premiership mastermind Alastair Clarkson in 2004.

It was the move which laid the foundation for four flags (2008 and 2013-15) as part of one of the most successful reigns in recent times.

Hawthorn president Andy Gowers lauded Dunstall’s on and off-field contribution to the brown and gold.

“Jason was an incredible player and has been such a significant figure at our club and in the league for decades,” Gowers said.

“Obviously on the field he was dominant but he was also a brilliant leader for Hawthorn off field as well, playing a key role in setting up our more recent premiership success.”

Originally published as How unselfish goal kicker Jason Dunstall become an Australian Football Legend