- He was eligible for admission five years after his retirement in 2010.
- He has been held back due to his past.
- The AFL has decided whether it will be on the 2024 list
The AFL has made a decision on whether former West Coast Eagles bad boy Ben Cousins will be eligible to enter the Hall of Fame in 2024.
The premiership and All Australian winner certainly has the playing credentials to achieve the league’s highest honour, but his well-documented battles with alcohol, drugs and his criminal past have held him back to date.
That includes a conviction for stalking his ex-partner, which led to him spending seven months in prison in 2020.
Cousins has changed his life enormously in recent years, looking healthy, clean and sober and landing a new job as a television news presenter in his hometown of Perth and with prospects of appearing on Seven’s Dancing with the Stars.
Those efforts have had no bearing on the AFL, however, as Cousins is ruled out for 2024 signings and reportedly won’t be considered for several more years.
Next month the hall of fame will welcome new members, with former Hawthorn striker Jason Dunstall promoted to Legend status.
Ben Cousins had many troubled years during and after his playing career, but he has cleaned up and is a picture of health in 2024.
The West Coast Eagles premiership winner would be inducted into the AFL Hall of Fame but has been held back due to his off-field actions.
Cousins had a long battle with drugs and alcohol and was convicted and jailed for stalking his ex-partner.
Members are chosen in part based on their character, and the hall of fame has updated its rules to allow for the removal or suspension of members, a decision sparked by the civil court conviction of Barry Cable for child sexual abuse.
However, despite the AFL’s recent actions to address violence against women, including a moment of silence and participants linking arms, Age It has been reported that Cousins was not considered for induction into the hall of fame even before these events.
The process of how the AFL makes these decisions is kept confidential.
It comes after the AFL announced that Cousins’ off-field scandals had not excluded him from the Hall of Fame in April.
“I will say it’s a pleasure to see Ben in the form he’s in now, and I’ve seen him quite a bit out west,” AFL commission chairman Richard Goyder said at the time.
‘Believe [Cousins’ recovery] It’s fantastic…what I would say with the Hall of Fame, and it’s almost my precursor to our committee discussions every year, is that it’s not about who’s in, it’s about who’s not.
“It’s an incredibly high bar to be a Hall of Famer in the AFL, and it’s an even higher bar to be a Legend, so we’ll look at those things in due time.”
Cousins has spent time at his old club, including this parents versus kids match in March.
The AFL also prevented former AFL star Wayne Carey from entering the New South Wales Hall of Fame due to allegations made against him during and after his playing career.
This decision comes shortly after the AFL prevented Wayne Carey from being honored as a Legend in the New South Wales Australian Football Hall of Fame because he had been accused of shocking behavior towards women during and after his playing career. .
In 2007, he was arrested in the United States for assaulting a policewoman. This came after her then-girlfriend Kate Neilson claimed he hit her in the face with a wine glass.
He admitted to attacking and resisting Miami police, but was not convicted. Neilson decided not to press charges.
“We didn’t think it was the right decision,” AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon said last week.
“I called Wayne Carey this morning to inform him of this and he agreed that becoming a Legend would de-emphasize the event and give importance to the national response to the issue of gender-based violence against women.”