Three champions of the West Coast Eagles, indeed greats of Australian football by any measure, were today inducted into the club’s Hall of Fame.
Stalwarts of the club’s 2006 premiership, captain Chris Judd, ruckman Dean Cox and full-back Darren Glass, who assumed the captaincy when Judd returned to Melbourne in 2008, joined the club’s truly elite at a combined third Hall of Fame induction and Season Launch at Crown Perth.
They join other luminaries (players) Michael Brennan, Brett Heady, Glen Jakovich, Dean Kemp, Chris Lewis, Chris Mainwaring, Peter Matera, Ashley McIntosh, Guy McKenna and Peter Sumich, as well as dual premiership coach Mick Malthouse, long-serving Chief Executive Officer Trevor Nisbett and revered head trainer Bill Sutherland in the Hall of Fame.
Judd could not attend the event because he would need to quarantine coming from Melbourne, but Cox was able to travel from NSW, where he is now an assistant coach at Sydney, and Glass was also present.
Chris Judd
Few players make an immediate impact at AFL level. Judd was one of them.
He won a Rising Star nomination on debut, played every game for the remainder of the season and finished third in the Club Champion Award. In his first five seasons, that was his lowest finish in what is now the John Worsfold Medal.
The brilliant midfielder announced himself with a bang and by the time he had registered his 100th game in the middle of the 2006 season, against Essendon at Telstra Dome, pundits across the country pondered whether there had been a more stunning start to a career in history.
Boasting explosive pace, remarkable balance and poise, he won every possible accolade in a remarkable career, initially at the West Coast Eagles and then, from 2008, with Carlton.
He was the first Eagle to win a Brownlow Medal in 2004, won two Club Champion Awards, the AFL Players Association Rookie of the Year (2002) and an MVP (2006), as well as three Ross Glendinning medals and the Norm Smith Medal in the 2005 losing grand final.
Such was his standing at the club that he assumed the captaincy in 2006, enjoying the moment of which dreams are made when he stood on the dais to receive the premiership cup on the last Saturday in September.
Judd continued his burgeoning career when he returned to his home State of Victoria, adding three consecutive John Nicholls Medals (2008-10) as Carlton’s fairest and best as well as the 2010 Brownlow Medal.
Darren Glass
An outstanding defender who won three Club Champion Awards, Glass also sits fourth on the club’s games played list with 270 matches.
A measure of his consistency is that nine times he finished in the top 10 in Club Champion Award voting and aside from the times when he won the John Worsfold Medal, he was also runner-up to Chris Judd in the 2006 premiership year.
Glass was rarely beaten in one-on-one contests, his upper body and core strength making it difficult for opposition forwards to work him off the line of the ball.
He is the only West Coast player to ever be selected as the all-Australian captain (in 2012), earning the distinction of being in the AFL’s team of the year four times.
When Judd returned to his native Melbourne at the end of the 2007 season, Glass was installed as skipper and went on to lead the club in 129 matches – second only in the number of games that he was captain behind Worsfold (138).
Dean Cox
One of the great success stories in the history of the club, Cox went from a rookie list player to the game’s record holder, retiring after 290 senior appearances in 2014.
He was virtually an extra midfielder in one of the best midfield groups in history – alongside Chris Judd, Ben Cousins and Daniel Kerr – such was the athleticism of the 203cm giant.
His impact on the game changed the prototype of the modern day big man. His ability to cover the ground, accumulating possessions and taking running bounces down the ground, took the role to another level.
Cox was a six-time all-Australian and was central to that gold plated midfield so pivotal in propelling West Coast to Grand Final appearances in 2005 and 2006, winning the club’s third premiership in the second of those games.
He finished top 10 in the Club Champion Award nine times in his career, winning the mantle in 2008 and finishing runner-up in 2012.
