Craig Bradley

Craig Bradley
Personal information
Full nameCraig Edwin Bradley
Date of birth23 October 1963
Place of birthAshford, South Australia
Height/Weight180 cm / 81 kg
Playing career1
YearsClubGames (Goals)
1981–1985
1986–2002		Port Adelaide
Carlton		98 (105)
375 (247)
Representative team honours
YearsTeamGames (Goals)
1983-1999South Australia19 (?)
1 Playing statistics correct to end of 2002 season.
Career highlights
Craig Bradley
Cricket information
Batting style Right-hand bat
Bowling style –
International information
National side
  • Australian
Career statistics
Competition Tests First-class
Matches 0 4
Runs scored 0 124
Batting average 0 17.71
100s/50s 0/0 0/0
Top score 0 46
Balls bowled 0
Wickets 0
Bowling average – 0
5 wickets in innings 0 0
10 wickets in match 0 0
Best bowling – 0
Catches/stumpings 0/0 3/0
Source:

Craig Edwin Bradley (born 23 October 1963) is a former professional Australian rules footballer and first class cricketer. He is the games record holder at the Carlton Football Club in the Australian Football League.

History

Born in Ashford in suburban Adelaide, Bradley made his senior football debut in 1981 as a seventeen-year-old for Port Adelaide in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL), which proved to be Port's third premiership season in a row. In his second season, Bradley won Port Adelaide's Best and Fairest award, and won two more, in 1984 and 1985; and, he was runner-up for the Magarey Medal in 1985.[1] Victorian Football League (VFL) club Essendon approached Bradley in 1981, but Bradley turned down the offer, wishing to remain in South Australia with Port Adelaide and to build on his promising cricket career. After 98 games with Port Adelaide, Bradley was recruited by VFL club Carlton in 1986 as part of a recruiting drive that also netted future captain Stephen Kernahan and Peter Motley.

Bradley had already played first class cricket for South Australia and various Australian junior sides and at first continued to play cricket for Victoria, although the increasing demands of football led him to retire from cricket after four first-class games. He played grade cricket for Port Adelaide until 1987/88 (originally returning to South Australia each summer after the football season to do so), and from 1988/89 until his retirement from cricket in around 1991, he played district cricket in Victoria for the Melbourne Cricket Club.[2] Bradley holds the distinction as the last active VFL/AFL player to win a Victorian district cricket premiership, achieving the feat in 1988/89,[3] and had an agreement with the Carlton Football Club that district cricket finals took precedence over early season home-and-away football games if there was a clash.[4]

Bradley won three Robert Reynolds Trophies as Carlton's Best & Fairest, in 1986, 1988 and 1993, as well as being a member of the 1987 and 1995 premiership sides. Bradley played with Carlton for seventeen seasons, acting as Kernahan's vice captain from 1990 until 1997, then captaining Carlton from 1998 to 2001. In this time, Bradley also represented Australia three times in the International Rules series, including as vice-captain in 2000 and captain in 2001. He broke Bruce Doull's Carlton games record in Round 1, 2002. Bradley's final AFL game, against Port Adelaide, was Round 19, 2002, polling 3 Brownlow Votes, at the age of 38 years, 9½ months, making him the sixth-oldest player in the history of the league. His final appearance overall was in the 2002 International Rules series.

In a senior career spanning 22 seasons, Bradley was renowned as one of the games tireless champions, and in particular his amazing fitness that meant he could play the physically demanding game of Australian rules football until the age of 38. For much of his career, Bradley played as an outside midfielder, rotating into the forward line during games, where his nous allowed him both to score and assist many goals through his career. In his final few seasons, Bradley spent more time acting as a loose, sweeping half-back flanker, and much of Carlton's drive forward came from his play through the wings.

Bradley's services to the game have been officially recognised several times at the highest levels. He was immediately inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 2006, after the minimum three years of retirement. At Carlton, Bradley is an Official Legend of the club's Hall of Fame, and was selected on the wing in the club's Team of the Century. He was also selected on the wing in Port Adelaide's Team of the Century.

In November 2002, following Carlton's salary cap breach which lost the club valuable draft picks, Bradley had contemplated reversing his decision to retire[5] and attempt to rebuild a club in crisis, but he eventually stood by his initial decision to retire from the game, which was made three weeks before the salary cap drama occurred.

In 2007, Bradley returned to Carlton as a part-time assistant coach.

Games Records

Craig Bradley's 375 games for Carlton, including 24 finals, is a club record. It was also, at the time of his retirement, the fourth-highest number of games played by any player in the VFL/AFL, behind only Simon Madden (378), Kevin Bartlett (403) and Michael Tuck (426). As of September 2014, he is seventh all-time.[6]

In addition to his time at Carlton, Bradley also played 98 games for Port Adelaide in the SANFL in 1981-85 (despite missing a large part of the 1983 season, touring England with the Young Australia cricket team),[7] in a time where senior games in the SANFL were considered equivalent to those in the VFL. He also represented South Australia nineteen times – in most years of his career from 1983 up until 1999, which was the final season of State of Origin football. He also played in nine International Rules games for Australia, which are also considered to be senior games. As such, he played 501 senior Australian football games, which is an all-time world record as far as any historians can trace . Bradley also represented Carlton a further 27 times in the night series, which (unlike in the Western Australian and South Australian leagues) are not counted as senior games by the AFL. Bradley's 500th game was the first international rules test against Ireland at Croke Park in 2002.

References

  1. ↑ Rohan Connolly (4 July 1993). "Craig Bradley: shaking the tag". The Sunday Age (Sport Liftout) (Melbourne, VIC). pp. 12–13.
  2. ↑ Cathy Gowdie (4 November 1988). "No break for Bradley, a man of all seasons". The Age (Melbourne, VIC). p. 29.
  3. ↑ Ben Huf. "Home Ground". Victorian Premier Cricket. Retrieved 7 April 2014.
  4. ↑ Damian Barrett (1 April 1991). "Braddles' day of pain and joy". Herald-Sun News-Pictorial (Melbourne, VIC). p. 77.
  5. ↑ Silvagni decides not to play - realfooty.com.au
  6. ↑ "Most career games". AFL Tables. Retrieved 20 September 2014.
  7. ↑ Young Australia in England Jul/Sep 1983, ESPNCricinfo

External links

See also

Awards
Preceded by
Nicky Winmar		 Michael Tuck Medallist
1997 		Succeeded by
Wayne Carey