IN a new exciting collaborative countdown, Rookie Me Central has teamed up with other independent media organisations to bring a 2022 AFL Women’s Top 50 Countdown. Every weekday from now until December 17, a new player will be named starting from 50th down to 1st, stemming from a combined eight Top 50 submissions. Among those who submitted Top 50s include Siren Sport‘s Gemma Bastiani, Women’s Australian Rules Football (WARF) Radio‘s Peter Holden, and a combined Outer Sanctum team’s Top 50.

Today we continue our countdown with number 17, Melbourne Women’s Tyla Hanks.

Tyla Hanks

Melbourne

League/s: AFLW, Vflw

Season/s: 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, S7, 2023, 2024

• Games [tot]: 68

• Goals [tot]: 16

• Disposals [avg]: 16.4

• Marks [avg]: 1.9

• Tackles [avg]: 4.8

• Cont. Poss: 6.6

• Uncont. Poss: 8.4

• Hitouts: 0.1

• Clearances: 2.7

• Inside 50s: 2.4

• Rebound 50s: 0.7

A first round draft pick in 2018, Hanks has gone from strength to strength the past three seasons, which culminated in a breakout 2021 season.

As one of the quieter ones vocally amongst the Demons’ line-up, Hanks is one of those players that lets her actions do the talking.

And boy did her actions do a lot of talking in 2021. After several key, experienced players left the Demons midfield bound for other clubs after the 2020 season, Hanks stood up and played a pivotal role in the Dees charge towards a Preliminary Final.

Across every stat, she recorded her career best figures in 2021.

Her average disposals shot up from a career average of 13.5 to a season average of 18.7. This included a career best 25 disposals against Adelaide in Round 7.

Breaking that down more, her kids and handball averages both went up from 7.6 and 5.9 a game respectively, to 9.9 and 8.8 a game respectively.

She also saw a light rise in both her average number of marks per game and average number of tackles per game. This culminated in a lot of offseason awards heading Hanks’ way at the end of the 2021 season.

She won the AFLW Rising Star Award, made the 22 Under 22 side and jointly won Melbourne’s Best and Fairest with Karen Paxman.

Like many in this part of the countdown, Hanks was a unanimous choice amongst our selectors, making everyone’s top 50. She was ranked as high as 10th and as low as 26th. With an average rank of 17th, Hanks finishes in 17th in our countdown.

ROOKIE ME CENTRAL’S 2022 AFL WOMEN’S TOP 50

#50 Ash Brazill (Collingwood) | ARTICLE
#49 Tayla Harris (Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#48 Courtney Hodder (Brisbane) | ARTICLE
#47 Eden Zanker (Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#46 Kirsty Lamb (Western Bulldogs) | ARTICLE
#45 Tyanna Smith (St Kilda) | ARTICLE
#44 Breanna Koenen (Brisbane) | ARTICLE
#43 Dana Hooker (West Coast) | ARTICLE
#42 Georgie Prespakis (Geelong) | ARTICLE
#41 Breann Moody (Carlton) | ARTICLE
#40 Hayley Miller (Fremantle) | ARTICLE
#39 Emma King (North Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#38 Dakota Davidson (Brisbane) | ARTICLE
#37 Meghan McDonald (Geelong) | ARTICLE
#36 Stacey Livingstone (Collingwood) | ARTICLE
#35 Daisy Pearce (Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#34 Rebecca Beeson (GWS) | ARTICLE
#33 Sarah Allan (Adelaide) | ARTICLE
#32 Kerryn Harrington (Carlton) | ARTICLE
#31 Janelle Cuthbertson (Fremantle) | ARTICLE
#30 Emily Bates (Brisbane) | ARTICLE
#29 Katie Brennan (Richmond) | ARTICLE
#28 Gemma Houghton (Fremantle) | ARTICLE
#27 Kate Hore (Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#26 Ellie McKenzie (Richmond) | ARTICLE
#25 Ruby Schleicher (Collingwood) | ARTICLE
#24 Ash Riddell (North Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#23 Ally Anderson (Brisbane) | ARTICLE
#22 Brittany Bonnici (Collingwood) | ARTICLE
#21 Darcy Vescio (Carlton) | ARTICLE
#20 Lauren Pearce (Melbourne) | ARTICLE
#19 Jaimee Lambert (Collingwood) | ARTICLE
#18 Isabel Huntington (Western Bulldogs) | ARTICLE
#17 Tyla Hanks (Melbourne)