SUNS AFLW midfielder Jamie Stanton is still taking in the fact she’s Gold Coast’s inaugural AFLW Club Champion.

Stanton was bestowed the honour on Tuesday night as part of the club’s virtual awards night, winning with 180 votes ahead of defensive duo Jade Pregelj and Lauren Ahrens in joint second place with 173 votes. 

“It’s an honour,” Stanton told the media on Wednesday morning.

“I was shocked and surprised and stunned at the fact that I’d won the award that every player strives to win at a club.

“It’s something that really made me smile and feel really recognised from the group and the coaching staff so I was ecstatic.” 

Stanton will be etched in the record books as the first player to win Gold Coast’s AFLW Club Champion award.

She’s one of a handful of players in the league to have notched 30 AFLW games and also won the Players’ Player award to go with her Club Champion gong. 

After a year of firsts for the club in its inaugural season, Stanton said the team was well placed to take the next step in 2021.

“The hardest thing at AFLW level with the expansion teams coming in is you just don’t have the experience.

“We obviously had a really young team and now all of those girls have got a good seven games into them and know where their capacity starts and where they can grow to.

“We now know what our baseline is and we know how we can get better and we can just add more and more experience on top of that.” 

After guiding the club as one of its leaders in 2020, Stanton said for herself personally there was still plenty of ambition to improve.

“I like to think I have more to give,” she said.

“You never know when you’ve reached your potential but I’m only 24 so the idea is to be playing for a lot longer.

“Hopefully there’s new growth coming from me and new development for next year and that’s the plan, to get better.

“I don’t want this to be the pinnacle just yet.”