It was an underwhelming start to the 2025 AFL season with two of the first four matches of the season postponed due to the cyclone that hit South-East Queensland. That left just two matches for the round in New South Wales to kick off the season.
As usual, we’ll share our thoughts from every match of the AFL season, along with our Brownlow vote predictions and projections using our own system which has a proven profitable history over many years. For full details on how it works, see the section at the bottom of the page. We hope you'll use our free Brownlow tips to help you find value during the season and built a green book before the big night.
For links to every round of the season and full count, head to our 2025 Brownlow Medal Leaderboard page and check out the latest Brownlow Odds.
2025 AFL Brownlow Opening Round Overview
A slow start to the 2025 AFL season with just the two games to kick off the season. It was a round for the young superstars - perhaps Brownlow medallists of the future - with Will Day and Finn Callaghan looking likely to be the early Brownlow leaders. Do you gamble and take them at big odds early in the season?
Check out our 2025 Opening Round Brownlow votes below and our updated 2025 Brownlow leaderboard here!
2025 AFL Brownlow Votes - Opening Round Match Analysis
Sydney 11.10.76 def by Hawthorn 14.12.96
The Hawks might be the real deal as they took care of the Swans at home to kick things off for season 2025. Will Day was outstanding in the first half, and despite being tagged after half time, he still ended up with 26 disposals, 6 tackles, 9 clearances and 3 goals. James Sicily (20 disposals, 8 marks, 1 goal), Lloyd Meek (14 disposals, 30 hitouts, 6 clearances, 2 goals) and Karl Amon (27 disposals, 6 marks, 1 goal) are likely to fight it out for the minor votes. Chad Warner (21 disposals, 2 goals) and Nick Blakey (26 disposals, 1 goal) were best for the Swans.
Will Day - 3
James Sicily - 2
Lloyd Meek - 1
GWS Giants 15.14.104 def Collingwood 6.16.52
The Giants were far too good for the Pies with young gun Finn Callaghan on fire with 33 disposals, 7 clearances and 2 goals in a clear best-on-ground performance. Sam Taylor (17 disposals, 13 marks, 1 goal) patrolled half-back while Josh Kelly (36 disposals, 7 marks) was back to his best. Harry Perryman (27 disposals) did well against his old side in his debut for the Pies, while Darcy Cameron (22 disposals, 7 marks, 37 hitouts) enjoyed the early injury to opponent Kieran Briggs.
Finn Callaghan - 3
Sam Taylor - 2
Josh Kelly - 1
For those who need a refresher on how our Brownlow vote predictor system works, we assign 6 votes per game so that our total votes are the same as the official 3-2-1 system, however we break up those votes as we see fit across potentially more than three players. Some games are really tough to call which way the votes will go, so a better predictive model is to split performances and assign half points to each player where there is doubt. So for example if two players dominate and it's too hard to split their performance, they are given 2.5 votes each, with the remaining 1 vote given to another player(s). This will give us a predictive total closer to their true total, rather than guessing. We can then form a 'range' for each player (i.e. a min and max we think players can poll) with the thinking behind this that the variations from the half votes will even out over the long term.
If you intend on using our Brownlow votes to bet why not consider one of the best Australian sports betting sites which offer some great features for new customers. Also be sure to check out our Twitter page at @Before_You_Bet and continue returning to the site for our AFL tips.
