The AFL Players Association has selected Fairfax Media writer Emma Quayle as the winner of its prestigious Grant Hattam Trophy – for a record third time.
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Quayle received the award for her feature story on Essendon footballer Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti. She traced the young Bomber's remarkable journey from Melville Island to the AFL through a candid interview with McDonald-Tipungwuti, his island family, his guardian Jane McDonald, recruiters and coaches.
The trophy has been awarded annually since 1999. It honours a journalist who has provided an insight into the lives of footballers with a piece that "encapsulates an aspect or aspects of football relevant to a player". It was created to honour the late Grant Hattam, a leading sports and media lawyer who died from cancer in 1998.
Quayle won in 2009 for "A street named desire" which documented the childhoods of draftees Nic Naitanui, Chris Yarran and Michael Walters who were long-term neighbours in Bushby Street in the Perth suburb of Midvale, and in 2012 for a print-digital package titled "Short Stories" about three footballers forced to retire at the age of 21 because of injury.
Other Age winners of the trophy are Michael Gleeson (2003 and 2014) and Samantha Lane (2007).
