It was rescheduled to Sunday 18 September at a week's notice, to avoid a clash with the funeral of Elizabeth II.

The event returned to its conventional format and venue—a gala dinner at the Crown Palladium in Melbourne—after having been held virtually for the previous two seasons due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Cripps was initially suspended by the Match Review Panel and AFL Tribunal in Round 21, for rough conduct in a front-on contest against Brisbane Lions' Callum Ah Chee, which ruled him ineligible and would have seen him miss the final rounds, in which he polled the winning votes;[3] Carlton had appealed the suspension to the AFL Appeals Board and was successful in overturning it.

[6] Several raids and arrests, including of second-year field umpire Michael Pell, were made in November 2022 after suspicious betting patterns into spot bets on the votes from many games Pell had umpired were investigated by sports corruption police.

[7] As of September 2023, investigations were ongoing and no charges have been formally laid, and Pell was no longer employed by the AFL.