Coaches Award vs MVP vs Best and Fairest: What's the Difference?
August 2026 | 5 min read
Most clubs hand out several individual awards each season, and the names get blurred. The coaches award, the MVP, and the best and fairest reward genuinely different things — and knowing the coaches award meaning (and how it differs from the vote-based awards) helps you explain your awards night and avoid handing two trophies for the same reason.
1. The Quick Answer
| Award | Recognises | Who decides |
|---|---|---|
| Coaches Award | Effort, attitude, improvement, and intangibles the coach values | The coach, at their discretion |
| MVP | The single most valuable player to the team's results | Vote (coach, players, or combined) |
| Best and Fairest | Consistent performance and fair play across the whole season | Season-long tally of round-by-round votes |
2. The Coaches Award
The coaches award is the coach's personal pick. It's not decided by a vote or a points tally — it's a discretionary award that recognises the things numbers miss: the player who trained hardest, improved the most, lifted team morale, or embodied the club's values. Because it's subjective, it's often the most emotional and meaningful award of the night.
3. Coaches Award Criteria
There's no fixed rulebook — that's the point of the award — but most coaches weigh some mix of the following when choosing their winner:
- Training attendance and effort — turns up, works hard, every week
- Improvement — the biggest gap between round 1 and the last game
- Coachability — listens, applies feedback, plays their role
- Attitude and resilience — response to setbacks, selection changes, or a tough season
- Team-first behaviour — lifts teammates, helps with the unglamorous jobs
- Club values — the player you'd point new families to as "that's how we do things here"
If you announce the criteria at the start of the season, the award lands better on the night — players know what it stands for, and parents can see it isn't just a consolation prize.
4. Coaches Award, Coach's Award or Coaches' Award?
All three spellings turn up on trophies and in club newsletters. Strictly, coach's award is correct for a single coach and coaches' award for a coaching group — but the apostrophe-free coaches award has become the standard form in Australian club sport, and it's what most engravers will put on the trophy. Pick one spelling for your club and use it everywhere.
5. MVP (Most Valuable Player)
The MVP goes to the player who contributed most to the team's success. Unlike the coaches award, it's usually decided by a vote — coach, players, or a weighted combination. "Valuable" is about impact on results, so an MVP isn't always the most skilful player; it might be the one whose absence the team would feel most.
6. Best and Fairest
The best and fairest is the flagship season award in Australian club sport. The "and fairest" part matters: it rewards both performance and sportsmanship, tallied across the whole season through round-by-round voting (often a 3-2-1 player of the match vote). Where MVP is a single judgement of overall value, best and fairest is a season-long accumulation. Our best and fairest voting guide covers how to run it end to end.
7. How to Run All Three Without Confusion
- Give each award a clear, written definition so players and parents understand what's being recognised
- Use votes for MVP and best and fairest, and keep the coaches award discretionary
- Avoid overlap — if the same player would win two on the same criteria, reconsider the categories
- Track the vote-based awards consistently all season, not from memory on the night
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