AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou says he hopes Ben Cousins is picked up by a club in this year’s draft in order to aid him with his rehabilitation.

St Kilda appeared to be the only club left in serious contention for the Brownlow Medallist, but its board voted on Tuesday night not to pursue him. That leaves the Brisbane Lions as the only apparent interested party after reports that new coach Michael Voss visited Cousins in Perth on the weekend.

The 30-year-old missed all of 2008 and the majority of 2007 as he battled drug addiction, and has until Wednesday to nominate for this year’s draft.

But Demetriou denied that the conditions that the AFL had placed on Cousins’ return were too onerous.

“As I’ve said on many occasions, we followed all the expert medical advice that helped the AFL make its decision, and that medical advice also contained the conditions,” he said on Tuesday morning.

“Those conditions were put there in the best interests of Ben Cousins, and to assist him in his rehabilitation.

“He’s now nominated for the draft, and if there are any clubs out there that are interested in drafting him, then he’ll be drafted with our blessing.

“We’ve made it clear that we think it would be a good thing if Ben Cousins plays football – we think it’s a very important part of his rehabilitation to get him back plying his trade, get him back into the workforce that he loves, and that’s playing football.

"It's a very important step in his recovery and where he ends up playing I have no preference whatsoever."

The St Kilda board issued a statement saying that as a result of a "complex five-month review" Cousins was not part of the club's plans. CEO Archie Fraser said: "We owed it to ourselves to undertake a rigorous and thorough review and have now made our decision. This is a decision that we didn't take lightly".

St Kilda said the details of its review on Cousins would remain confidential.