Sydney Roosters second-rower Olivia Kernick has been awarded the 2024 Dally M Medal, ahead of the NRLW Grand Final this weekend.
The 23-year-old international rugby league player received the Player of the Year accolade at last night’s Dally M awards ceremony.
Kernick finished the 2024 NRLW season with 22 points in the final Dally M Medal points tally, followed by Gold Coast Titan’s Lauren Brown on 20, followed by Parramatta Eels’ Abbi Church on 19.
Upon receiving the award, Kernick thanked the Sydney Roosters captain Isabelle Kelly and coach John Strange, as well as her team for getting her to where she is today.
“I didn’t expect this this year,” Kernick said. “I’m a bit caught off guard.
“This year with the Women’s NRL, we’ve produced a really good product and taken the competition to another level so I’m grateful to be part of it.”
Kernick finished the 2024 season with four tries, six line breaks and a 90.4 per cent tackle efficiency.
Four of the eleven players in the Dally M Team of the Year were from the Sydney Roosters, including Kernick, centre Isabelle Kelly, prop Millie Boyle and hooker Keely Davis.
All four Roosters and Dally M team players will play this weekend in the NRLW Grand Final, as the Sydney Roosters face off against the Cronulla Sharks, who finished in fourth place on the ladder this season. The Roosters finished second on the ladder behind the Brisbane Broncos in for and against points.
There was one Cronulla Sharks player in the Dally M Team of the Year, centre Tiana Penitani. She was also named Captain of the Year at last night’s award ceremony. Meanwhile, St George Illawarra Dragons’ halfback Kasey Reh was named Rookie of the Year.
The 2024 NRLW Grand Final is being played at Sydney’s Accor Stadium on Sunday 6 October at 3:55pm AEST. You can watch the final on Channel 9 or stream it on Nine Now.
This season has been one for the NRLW history books, thanks to a surge of interest in women’s sport in Australia.
In this year’s State of Origin series, the Maroons and Blues were in “unchartered territory”: never before had an NRLW State of Origin series gone to a Game III decider. But with the series drawn at 1-1 at the end of Game II, it was pushed into a deciding match for the first time.
It wasn’t the only history-making moment from the 2024 State of Origin series. The opening match in Newcastle was played in front of a crowd of 25,492 – nearly double the crowd of the 2023 opening match (12,972).