Bonnie Toogood has been recognised for her contributions to the Western Bulldogs Community Foundation, claiming the Community Award at Saturday’s AFLW Best and Fairest formalities. 

The 23-year-old was involved in various WBCF programs throughout 2020, highlighting the GOAL Mentoring program as one she learnt a lot from in particular.

“For me it was really important to get involved with the Community Foundation – I weirdly think I took more out doing the GOAL program than what the participants did,” Toogood said during her acceptance speech.

“The whole idea of being a mentor and being able to help someone – I just really loved it, and it was a really cool opportunity to be part of.

“It’s great to be part of a club that offers those programs for us to get involved in and be able to help people.”

WBCF General Manager Kashif Bouns said Toogood’s efforts – particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic – were second to none. 

“2020 as we know was a tough year for everyone, but we as a football club and Community Foundation were really proud to be able to take our programs online and support our community during a very tough period,” Bouns said.

“Taking the programs online did make it a little bit harder for our players to get engaged, but we still had a number of players make a significant contribution throughout the year.

“One player stood out for her significant contributions across all of our programs, and that was Bonnie.”

Toogood was also a joint-winner of the Players’ Player award alongside Bailey Hunt, and finished fifth in the Best and Fairest count with 39 votes.

Captain Ellie Blackburn was named Club Champion for a second time, polling 72 votes.