IT WAS Lou Richards, behind the microphone, who aptly surmised the single incident for which Leigh Matthews the player is perhaps best remembered.

With the ball wedged deep in the Windy Hill forward pocket in the final quarter of a critical late-season game against Essendon in 1982, the Hawthorn champion's single-mindedness would let nothing get in the way, least of all a point post, which split in two when met by Matthews' short but very sturdy frame.

"What a he-man!" Richards screamed, overcome with admiration at the display of brute strength. He wasn't the only one impressed. It was Ron Barassi, one of our judging panel for this Age Top 50 series, who ended up buying the splintered post for his collection of football memorabilia.

Have your say on the greatest AFL players of all time.

The barrel-chested Matthews was incredibly strong and tough for his 178 centimetres. It was Richards, too, who dubbed the pocket battleship "Lethal", a nickname that became universal.

But that was as much testament to Matthews' capacity to tear opponents apart with his dazzling skills as his steely-minded, physical demeanour on the field.

While he'd split the post that day against Essendon, what should also be remembered is that it was a dazzling last quarter from the little champ that won the Hawks an important game that helped secure them a double chance.

It was that capacity to take a game by the scruff of the neck that marked Matthews' entire career, as late as the penultimate match of his 332-game career, when he helped lift his team over the top of Footscray and into the third of what would become a string of seven consecutive grand finals.

That day, it was in the small-forward role to which Matthews had gravitated in his latter years. The season before, he'd lined up at full-forward in the premiership play-off, and the year before that in the first of three straight grand finals against Essendon, kicked six goals and led his team to a then-record 83-point win.

In fact, look simply at the raw statistics of Matthews' career, which include 915 goals at 2.76 a game, the 1975 Coleman Medal with a tally of 68, the Hawks' goalkicking award six times, and hauls of 11 twice, and you'd be excused for thinking he'd always done his best work near the goalface.

But Matthews' gifts as a destructive onballer were even more phenomenal, a ball magnet whose evasive skills and disposal by foot or hand were pure class. He was part, along with Don Scott and Michael Tuck, of one of the great ruck-roving combinations of the 1970s.

He loved the physical stuff, but his capacity to wear it as well as dish it out, his prolonged durability through arguably football's toughest era, and his unshakeable focus and concentration made him almost the perfect ground-level player.

Perhaps the loudest statement of Matthews' greatness came with his incredible record of eight best-and-fairest wins with Hawthorn at a time when the Hawks were at their peak, with a galaxy of stars.

Curiously, he never fared as well in the Brownlow Medal, third twice despite favouritism on several occasions. Maybe it reflected his tremendous competitive spirit. He was never one to bite his tongue for the sake of diplomacy.

A devoted football realist and pragmatist, traits which have become even more apparent during Matthews' equally spectacular coaching career with Collingwood and the Brisbane Lions, little fazed him.

Indeed, the one moment that seemed to shake the unshakeable one came right at the twilight of his playing days, an unsavoury off-the-ball incident during a game against Geelong in which Matthews broke the jaw of Cats little man Neville Bruns, retribution swift at the hands of Bruns' teammate Steven Hocking.

There was subsequent public outrage and the involvement of police, Matthews was deregistered for four matches and briefly considered retirement. But he stuck it out to the end of his final season, leading the Hawks into another grand final, at the end of which he was chaired from the field by his defeated but proud teammates.

After their skipper had shouldered so much responsibility for the Hawks over so long a period, it was the very least they could do.

LEIGH MATTHEWS

Born: March 1, 1952

Height: 178cm Weight: 83.5kg

Club: Hawthorn (1969-85)

Recruited from: Chelsea

VFL/AFL debut: Round 16, 1969 v Melbourne at the MCG

Games: 332

Goals: 915

Honours: Four-time premiership player (1971, 1976, 1978, captain in 1983), eight-time Hawthorn best and fairest (1971, 1972, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980, 1982), Hawthorn captain 1981-85, Coleman medallist 1975, six-time Hawthorn leading goalkicker (1973, 1975, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984), VFLPA MVP Award 1982, All-Australian 1972, Victorian representative on 14 occasions (captain in 1980), inaugural Legend of Australian Football Hall of Fame, forward pocket in AFL Team of the Century, rover in Hawthorn Team of the Century, four-time premiership coach (Collingwood 1990, Brisbane Lions 2001-03), Collingwood coach 1986-95, Brisbane Lions coach 1999-current.