Brian Wilson

DOB: 30 September, 1961
MFC Debut: Round 1, 1982 against Sydney at SCG,
Last MFC Game: Round 21, 1990 against Richmond at Waverley

Games: 154 (209 total)
Goals: 208 (246 total)
Career Statistics (external link)

Wins	Draws	Losses	Winning %
74	0	80	48.05

From: Braybrook/Footscray/North Melbourne

Number: 7 1982-1990

Honours
Brownlow Medal - 1982
Leading Goalkicker - 1985
Grand Final player - 1988
Victorian State Player - 1982, 1983, 1988 (3 games)
Reserves Premiership player - 1984

Statistical categories led:
Most average disposals in a season: 27.71 - 1982

Wilson joined Footscray from the Braybrook Under 15's and played his first games for Footscray as a 16-year-old. He played nine games over two seasons before leaving to join North Melbourne in 1980 when coach Royce Hart said he would spend the year in the Under 19's.

After losing 15kg he embarked on a first season with North that he ranked as equal to or better than his Brownlow season. Wilson had a disappointing 1981 and the lifelong North fan was discarded by the Roos. He finished third in the Best and Fairest that year. It was suggested that he and Stephen Icke were both sold to Melbourne to raise money to buy the Krakoeur brothers.

Crossing to the Demons in 1982 he won the Brownlow Medal in his first season with Melbourne, and at 20 was the youngest player to win the award since Bob Skilton in 1959. In a season where he averaged 28 touches a game and earnt seven best on ground nods Wilson stormed to the award with a five vote win over his old teammate Ross Glendinning.

Though he never hit the heights of his Brownlow winning season again, Wilson was one of his sides most exciting players. 39 goals in 1983 (including a career high seven in round 3 against Sydney) and a team leading 40 in 1985 came on either side of an injury destroyed 1984. In a practice match against North Melbourne he broke his arm badly sliding into the MCG fence and didn't play until round 16 that year.

Wilson was one of the best Demons in their exciting 1987 rise to the finals. He polled 12 Brownlow Votes to finish equal 10th but suffered a wretched run with injuries towards the end of the year. A twisted ankle in the Round 22 win over Footscray caused him to miss the Elimination Final, then he sat out most of the Semi Final a week later after a knock to the face gave him blurred vision. He recovered to play in the Preliminary Final but suffered a broken collarbone which would have kept him out of the Grand Final even if the Demons had made it.

Wilson earned another two best on ground nods in 1988 as he played every match en route to the Grand Final.

He retired at the end of 1990 after suffering a severe hamstring rupture in Round 21, but was coaxed back into the game by St. Kilda for one more season. In fact they drafted him without Wilson having nominated for the draft with Wilson thinking his career was over.

He played just seven games in 1991, but one of them was a six goal matchwinner against the Dees. He suggested he might have stayed in the game had the Demons tried to talk him out of retirement as stridently as the Saints, but coach John Northey said "He's retired every year since I've been here. Leave me out of that one".

Retired again from the Saints halfway through '91, Wilson made a late season comeback with Heidelberg in the Diamond Valley League and coached them for a season.

He owned the Canadian Bay hotel in Mt. Eliza in 2006.