#10 St Francis de Agressi - up to 2021 round 2

Surely I wouldn’t respond with nonsense to someone saying “you called him soft, you may as well call him a child rapist”? What an incredible thing to suggest.

However were you aiming for irony by decrying as nonsense what was essentially agreement with your argument that all AFL players are tough.

Francis has a tendency to back himself aerially rather than engage in body on body contests.
In this he’s similar to Joey.
Similarly it’s something to work on, particularly as a defender, although I think there’s an argument that he’s still growing into his potential muscles, so to say. It’s also a tricky development point to sell to him, given he’s so good at playing his way.

Well i am really pleased to hear that
It gives me comfort
We need to build a tough uncompromising team
If Francis watches also how Gibson played who was not very tall it may assist
I would love Francis to live out his full potential of what he showed last year and become a star
After all he wears no 10!!!

It’s just hyperbole. He’s talking about an attack on somebodies character. Don’t take it too literally.

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Let’s not forget his incredibly hard tackle though. I can’t remember who it was on but i’m surprised they got straight up.

Give the kid a break, he has been playing forward for the last few months and then off a four day break is asked to play back.

He did ok, made some blues and was outbodied, but most if not all his teammates made errors in that game too.

Persist with him, it will pay off.

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Francis tired towards the end of the game after a four day break. When one tires his not as strong, skill level a judgement also drops off.

He was good early and tired in the last. Miss gudged a couple of balls. And was out positioned a bit to easily.

But all in all he did a good job all thing considered.

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What an unnecessary overreaction

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It’s just stupid.

But amusingly your point to me, is kind of the inverse of mine to him. We might be in an Escher drawing.

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Some players do pull out of contests for self preservation. Doesn’t mean they are soft all the time but it’s not a good luck and you wouldn’t want to see it regularly or you have issues.
Just as an example, Gibbs last night just before the 1/2 time siren had a chance to drop in front of Hawkins and yes he would have been crunched but he pulled out and allowed an easy chest mark for a shot on goal after the siren. Compare that to Dalhaus who twice without fear backed into a contest to effect the spoil and was crunched for his troubles. I would drop Gibbs for it and that was always my non negotiable as a coach

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Bacchus is just saying it’s the worst thing, ie the biggest put down you can level at an AFL footy player. If you want to be a literalist and pick a fight whenever someone sensationalises or uses hyperbole to catch attention, don’t ever read a newspaper, watch a movie or eat anything from a Michelin star restaurant, especially if it’s called l’escargot.

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Yeah, I started writing a glorious retort last night also, and then remembered there is really no point.

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Now I could be really annoying and argue that I wasn’t being literalist but anti-inflationary-sensationalist, but my coffee is here and a headline about the Royal family has me in a dither.

Worth noting that on a couple of these occasions where he was “soft” or “easily outbodied” it was because he was pushed square in the back in the contest.

No free, of course.

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He needs to harden his back.

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Finlayson in the pocket in the 4th springs to mind. Two hands pretty clearly in the back if memory serves.

Hopefully Woosha or Mark Harvey are teaching him the correct technique as to how to use his body or punch the ball

Late in the game he approached a couple of players wrestling for the mark, flew in front of them hoping to kill the ball at the highest point, misjudged it, missed it and was left in no-mans land and completely out of the contest while his opponent picked the ball up and goaled.

I think he needs to use his talent but also play the common sense percentages.

Geelong almost 100% of the time make the correct disciplined percentage decisons despite being talented.

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Most definitely. A couple of times he just judged it wrong but there were definitely a couple where he was pushed under the contest

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Both his natural positioning and his natural ball-flight-reading error seem to lend itself to being slightly under the ball.

Given time, confidence, and trust, he’ll learn that against AFL opponents he’ll have to push back ferociously like Hooker would.

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