Richmond captain Trent Cotchin and former Hawthorn, now West Coast player Sam Mitchell have become the first current AFL players to be retrospectively presented with Brownlow medals.

Cotchin received his Brownlow from three-time winner Ian Stewart, who was the last Richmond player to win the award in 1971, after winning two medals while playing for St Kilda in 1965 and 1966.

Since the Brownlow Medal count in 2012, Cotchin has had two children with wife Brooke, who were all at Tuesday’s ceremony.

“As Sam and I have discussed since knowing that we were going to be awarded the 2012 medal, we had to embrace it, it was an exciting opportunity to invite our closest friends and family and those that have supported us all the way through,” he said.

“Any AFL player who has a wife and partner understands the ups and downs of an AFL careers, whether it’s injury, loss, criticism … you need someone that’s really strong behind you, otherwise you do probably curl up into a ball.”

Mitchell was presented his medal by former Hawk Shane Crawford who won the AFL’s highest individual honour in 1999.

The AFL veteran thanked his family, particularly his wife, for their support over the years.

“The most important thing for me is my family, for anyone who knows my they are clearly the number one thing in my life,” he said.

“I learnt a lesson one game when one of the kids were sick, and I played a game when I shouldn’t have and for the only time in my life that I put my career before my family.

“It’s something that I vow never to do again, and thankfully I’ve been able to make up for that.”

It has been a big post-season for Mitchell, who left Hawthorn as a four-time premiership player and five-time best and fairest winner at the club to move to Perth to join the West Coast Eagles.

Remarkably, since leaving Hawthorn, Mitchell has also now become a Brownlow medallist.

Sam Mitchell pays tribute to Hawthorn

In accepting his award, Mitchell acknowledged the Hawthorn Football Club’s coach players and medical support staff.

“Although I’ve moved on now, it’s just such a fantastic club, it’s been through such a heavy phase of change, and great people around the footy club – whether that’s Clarko [Alastair Clarkson], Hodgey [Luke Hodge] and obviously Roughy [Jarryd Roughead] – have been a big part of my life for a long time now,” he said.

Sam Mitchell (left) is retrospectively awarded the 2012 Brownlow Medal by 1999 Brownlow medallist Shane Crawford. Photo: AAP

“I’m just so rapt for him and can’t wait for him to get back out and play, that’s going to be one of the great moments of next season.”

Cotchin and Mitchell were last month declared joint winners of the 2012 Brownlow after Essendon’s Jobe Watson was ruled ineligible for the award.

Mitchell thanked the AFL for giving the two men the chance to enjoy the belated win.

“This is a pretty special time for me and the family, being able to share it. This is something that I’m really, really proud to share with my closest people,” he said.

“Thank you all for being here, and to Trent’s side – it is a bit like a wedding – thanks everyone for being here and thanks to the AFL for putting this on for us and giving us a bit of freedom to actually enjoy the day.”

Modern-era joint Brownlow awards

Watson polled 30 votes in 2012, four ahead of Cotchin and Mitchell who were joint second in that year’s count.

Watson was deemed ineligible for the award after being suspended for 12 months for his involvement in the Essendon supplements scandal in 2012.

The only other time Brownlow medals have been presented retrospectively, was in 1989 when the league awarded medals to players who had topped the vote count but either lost on countback or had not won the medal outright.

Jobe Watson of Essendon with the Brownlow Medal in 2012. Photo: AAP

Prior to 1980 only one medal was awarded each season.

Players who tied the vote count were separated by the countback system which awarded the medal to the player with the most number of three votes. If players had an equal number of three votes, then the player with the most number of two votes claimed the medal.

In 1940, Collingwood’s Des Fothergill and South Melbourne’s Herb Matthews could not be separated by a countback and no medal was presented.

Fothergill and Matthews were given replicas of the medals, but no official medal was given to either player until the retrospective presentation 49 years later.

-ABC