Mabior Chol is 10 years, 115 games and three clubs into his AFL career, but still the League doesn’t quite know what to make of the 200cm Sudanese-born forward/ruckman.
He’s athletic, charismatic and wonderfully talented, and boasts a highlights reel overloaded with spectacular moments.
He’s ‘smooth’. So smooth that he’s often referred to as the ‘Chols Royce’.
But the football industry is in raging disagreement on exactly where he sits on football value. Is he legitimately a key pillar in a premiership side? Or not?
It is a question that will not be answered until September, when Chol takes on what potentially will be a key role in Hawthorn’s bid for their first flag since 2015.
Last Thursday night at Marvel Stadium Chol passed a statistical career milestone which adds further to the debate without offering any sort of definitive answer either way. And gives cause to look at some interesting statistics of Queenslanders in the AFL.
Chol had 10 possessions and kicked two goals in Hawthorn’s 52-point win over St Kilda to became the 68th Queenslander to top 1000 AFL possessions.
He did so in his 115th game aged 29 years 119 days, having kicked 167 career goals.
He took more games than all expect Lions triple premiership ruckman Clark Keating to 1000 possessions, but has kicked more goals than all but Hawthorn champion Jason Dunstall (348) and Adelaide/Sydney spearhead Kurt Tippett (182).
And he was sixth-oldest behind Collingwood/GWS utility Lachie Keeffe (33 years 127 days), Gold Coast defender Rory Thompson (31/70), Keating (30/160), four-club ruckman Ben Hudson (30/87) and Bulldogs/GWS utility Sam Reid (29/262).
So is Chol a player who just doesn’t win a lot of football? Or is he a player who makes maximum use of it?
Historically, Ray Smith was the first Queenslander to 1000 possessions in 1975. He was followed by Richard Murrie, Essendon/Brisbane forward Frank Dunell, Fitzroy/Brisbane 200-gamer Scott McIvor, Dunstall, Collingwood premiership player Gavin Crosisca, North/Sydney wingman Dean McRae, Brisbane 300-gamer Marcus Ashcroft, Hawthorn ruckman Stephen Lawrence and Brisbane’s Troy Clarke.
Current Lions ace Will Ashcroft was quickest to 1000 possessions at 43 games – nine quicker than McIvor and Collingwood/Brisbane midfielder Dayne Beams (52), Lions champion Michael Voss and ex-teammate Cheynee Stiller (54), Marcus Ashcroft and current Lions veteran Dayne Zorko (56), and Carlton/Brisbane utility Tom Bell, Brisbane defender Josh Drummong and Collingwood goal-sneak Josh Thomas (57).
Voss was youngest at 20 years 56 days, ahead of McIvor (20/350), Marcus Ashcroft (20/283), McIvor (20/350), Will Ashcroft (21/23), Dayne Beams (21/169), current Lions utility Jaspa Fletcher (21/172), Brisbane Brownlow Medallist Jason Akermanis (21/179), Crosisca (21/260), StKilda captain Nick Riewoldt (21/274) and Gold Coast/Western Bulldogs defender Jarrod Harbrow (21/323).
And behind Dunstall, Tippett and Chol on the goal list at 1000 possessions are Brisbane’s Eric Hipwood (152), Sydney/Collingwood forward Jesse White (114), Brisbane/Adelaide goalsneak Charlie Cameron (102), Essendon/Port utility Che Cockatoo-Collins (91), Gold Coast/Port Adelaide power forward Charlie Dixon (91), Riewoldt (91) and Keating (83).
Chol is something of a rarity among the Queensland football products to play in the AFL, having played at three clubs – Richmond, Gold Coast and Hawthorn.
Only Hudson and Tom Hickey have worn the colors of four clubs, while Chol, Mal Michael, Braydon Preuss, Andrew Raines, Trevor Spencer, Trent Knobel, Richard Murrie and Corey Wagner have played for three clubs.
But unlike the others, who have played minimal games at at least one club, Chol has enjoyed a reasonable stay at each – 31 games and a VFL premiership at Richmond from 2016-21, 30 games and a VFL premiership at Gold Coast (2022-23) and now 54 games at Hawthorn since 2024. He was the leading AFL goal-kicker at Gold Coast in 2022 and Hawthorn in 2024,
It’s been quite a remarkable journey for a man born in South Sudan but at age two fled with his family to Egypt during civil war, and settled at suburban Acacia Ridge in Brisbane in 2005.
Also a talented soccer player and basketballer, he took up Australian football at 12 at Yeronga State High School before joining the Yeronga/South Brisbane Devils.
A member of the Lions Academy in 2014-15, he later played with the Lions and Aspley in the NEAFL, and with an Allies Under-18 side as the curtain-raiser to the 2015 AFL grand final.
Drafted at #30 in the 2015 rookie draft, ahead of 200-game Port Adelaide/Collingwood defender Dan Houston at #45, Chol debuted in Round 23 2016 but had to wait until Round 13 2019 for his second game.
Nine games later he was delisted and taken back by the Tigers at #45 in the 2019 Rookie Draft, and played his first AFL final in the Covid season of 2020, losing to Brisbane at the Gabba in the qualifying final.
After 31 games in six years at Richmond Chol was traded to Gold Coast, where 22 games and 44 goals in 2022 had local fans thinking ‘he’s a gun’. But after eight games in an injury-plagued second season on the tourist strip he was traded to Hawthorn.
He’s been a consistent performer for the Hawks, kicking 37 goals in 23 games (two finals) in 2024 and 42 goals in 24 games (three finals) last year, when the Hawks lost to Geelong in the preliminary final.
A hamstring injury in Round 5 sidelined him for five weeks, but the fact that he went straight back into the senior side in Round 11 is proof of how highly he is regarded by coach Sam Mitchell, and in Round 12 last weekend he hit 1000 possessions.
Only 12 Queenslanders played last weekend as the SUNS enjoyed a bye, and only Chol, the Bulldogs’ Connor Budarick and Fremantle’s Corey Wagner enjoyed a win.
Budarick had 22 possessions and was a good contributor in their four-point win over Collingwood at Marvel on Saturday, and Wagner, playing his first game at the Gabba, picked up 17 possessions in Fremantle’s 25-point Gabba win over Brisbane.
Statistically, Will Ashcroft was the pick of the Queenslanders in the Brisbane side with 22 possessions and two goals from Harris Andrews, who collected 10 possessions, seven marks, six intercept possessions and a game-high three contested marks.
