\n A host of potential future GIANTS stars were recently given a first-hand look at the life of an AFL athlete.\n <\/p>\n
A host of potential future GIANTS stars were recently given a first-hand look at the life of an AFL athlete, with the club hosting some of its elite under 17 Academy talent at GIANTS HQ.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Exciting GIANTS Academy prospects\u00a0Baden\u00a0Smith,\u00a0Cooper\u00a0French,\u00a0Aiden Henderson,\u00a0Elijah Roff\u00a0(ACT),\u00a0Franklin Murray-Wright\u00a0(Corowa),\u00a0Luke\u202fBechaz,\u00a0Boston Macri\u00a0(Riverina),\u00a0Sullivan O\u2019Dwyer, and\u00a0Brynley Ryan\u00a0(Western Sydney) spent the day rubbing shoulders with their idols to get a glimpse of the day-to-day routine of life at the elite level.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The unique experience allowed the young stars to sit\u00a0in\u00a0on some of the AFL team meetings and walk throughs, watch training, go through a gym session in the club gym, connect with GIANTS players over meals and throughout the day,\u00a0before finishing with some involvement with the club\u2019s VFL training that night\u00a0<\/p>\n
GIANTS Head of Talent Adrian Caruso said it was great to\u00a0show the young crop what life at the elite level is like.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe our crop of under 17 talent is promising so\u00a0we\u00a0wanted to give them some exposure to the AFL environment early in their 17th\u202fyear to see what it\u2019s\u00a0all about,\u201d\u00a0Caruso said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u202f\u201cWe want to invest in our Academy\u00a0talent\u00a0and we feel any chance we can get to give them a taste may hopefully motivate them\u00a0even further\u00a0to fully\u00a0invest and chase their AFL dream.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u202f\u201cThe boys stepped into some VFL training as well which was a great chance for them to see the level and train against men.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
GIANTS Head of Academies Jason\u00a0Saddington\u00a0echoed Caruso\u2019s sentiment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a huge amount of potential and upside within this group of young men,\u201d he said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe opportunity to bring them into the club for some elite level exposure should help develop and motivate the boys as we prepare for our upcoming Academy season.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen the opportunity\u00a0presented,\u00a0they shelved any school holiday plans to make themselves available.\u202f They are keen and hungry to learn\u00a0which is great to see.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u202f\u201cWhilst not eligible for drafting until 2027, these boys will be a huge influence on our Academy team as we hit our match program. They will be exposed to the highest level of football on a national scale and will be competing regularly against those players who are up for drafting in the 2026 draft.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u202f\u201cWe look forward to providing more opportunities for our emerging male and female athletes over the course of the AFL and AFLW season.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A host of potential future GIANTS stars were recently given a first-hand look at the life of an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":446086,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-446085","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-text"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=446085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446085\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/446086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=446085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=446085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=446085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}