Greig: Lillee could be 'a bit of a fairy

Er, here's the match. He made 27 out of 68. I remember it well cos it was one of the very early series I followed very closely via radio and the ABC highlights each arvo. Francis got a good hand from the crowd for his effort.

Having said that, he was sh!t, but certainly hasn't got the worst statistical record to go with your vitriol.

lardbucket wrote:Francis made 132 v ROW and Dougie made 100 as well. It was the only decent innings Francis ever played in Australia.

No. I'm thinking of a Shield game. Will see if I can find it. I think both players made upwards of 150, I think v the Vomits.

Didn't happen ... he made 132, or 117 or something, while Walters pasted the ROW 'attack' around. The game was half serious. The NSW middle order consisted of players like John Wilson and Hugh Martin.

I found his Shield figures from 1970-71, the year before he debuted for Australia:

7 games, 12 innings, HS 75, 317 runs in total, average 26.43

(source: AustralianCricket Yearbook, 1971)

He was sh!t, skully.

lardbucket wrote:Didn't happen ... he made 132, or 117 or something, while Walters pasted the ROW 'attack' around. The game was half serious. The NSW middle order consisted of players like John Wilson and Hugh Martin.

Um, no. Here's the Shield match I had in mind. It was v the Vomits in Oct/Nov 1971. You got the 132 for Francis right. Dougie made 158 and they put on 259 for the 3rd wicket. He also made a tidy 87 v the touring World XI for NSW shortly after.

No argument that he was sh!t, mate, just refuting your "worst ever" tag.

lardbucket wrote:I found his Shield figures from 1970-71, the year before he debuted for Australia:

7 games, 12 innings, HS 75, 317 runs in total, average 26.43

(source: AustralianCricket Yearbook, 1971)

He was sh!t, skully.

Er, have a look at 71-72, which was the season that got him on the 72 Ashes tour.

In that same year, the year that Francis put forward those undeniable credentials (born in NSW) ... Ashley Woodcock scored 525 at 47.72, Alan Turner scored 414 at 29,57, Ken McAullay scored 254 at 31.75, Derek Chadwick scored 581 at 34.18, Sam Trimble scored 642 at 42.80, and Ken Eastwood scored 742 at 92.75.

Eastwood played one game and was dropped, Woodcock got one Test two years later, Turner debuted 5 years later, and the rest never played. Francis got 6 games for Australia, and was sh!t in every one.

skully wrote:

lardbucket wrote:I found his Shield figures from 1970-71, the year before he debuted for Australia:

7 games, 12 innings, HS 75, 317 runs in total, average 26.43

(source: AustralianCricket Yearbook, 1971)

He was sh!t, skully.

Er, have a look at 71-72, which was the season that got him on the 72 Ashes tour.

I know that ... as fairly clear in my post ... but he was sh!t in 1971-2 as well. One century, v hacks, in a picnic game.

He did feel up your girlfriend, didn't he???

lardbucket wrote:

skully wrote:

lardbucket wrote:I found his Shield figures from 1970-71, the year before he debuted for Australia:

7 games, 12 innings, HS 75, 317 runs in total, average 26.43

(source: AustralianCricket Yearbook, 1971)

He was sh!t, skully.

Er, have a look at 71-72, which was the season that got him on the 72 Ashes tour.

I know that ... as fairly clear in my post ... but he was sh!t in 1971-2 as well. One century, v hacks, in a picnic game.

I'm sure horrie and the boys will be delighted with the hack tag for the Vomits.

Here's the match in case you missed it. I doubt the Viles EVER treated a Shield game v the Blues as a "picnic" game.

I had tuned in to see how Dougie went and that's when Francis' name became known to me. They put on a bucket of runs.

Hehehe, how grouse is Bails? What started as a weak sledge by Greigy at DKL to sell a new book has turned into a "worst player picked for Aus" fest.

phurt...lardy's argument about the over rated but aptly named Spiv holds true

lardbucket wrote:In that same year, the year that Francis put forward those undeniable credentials (born in NSW) ... Ashley Woodcock scored 525 at 47.72, Alan Turner scored 414 at 29,57, Ken McAullay scored 254 at 31.75, Derek Chadwick scored 581 at 34.18, Sam Trimble scored 642 at 42.80, and Ken Eastwood scored 742 at 92.75.

Eastwood played one game and was dropped, Woodcock got one Test two years later, Turner debuted 5 years later, and the rest never played. Francis got 6 games for Australia, and was sh!t in every one.

Who was the Aus selection panel at the time? DGB and who else? And again, these are 70-71 figures, not 71-72. That hulking 90 average got Kenny Eastwood his one and only Test in 70-71.

horace wrote:phurt...lardy's argument about the over rated but aptly named Spiv holds true

And also that Francis made his 132 v a hack team? I note the mighty Ken Eastwood made 14 and 17 in the match in question, which the hacks lost by an innings.

Fark these temperamental wireless connections.

DGB + Ridings + Loxton.

Yes skulls, I know 1970-71 was the season before Francis debuted v ROW ... in fact I did say that in the post where I put the relative stats from 1970-71 in.

He did crab his way to 132 v the Vixen ... then I think he ran Dougie out, with the total at 311. It was this score and the 87 he made for NSW v ROW (unlucky for the ROW, though they may have been trying to play him into the Australian side) that got him all those games for Australia ... 3 tests and two Rep games more than he warranted. Alan Jones of Queensland made 132 and 73 v the ROW in one game, but he never got a look in.

Francis' representative games for Australia in 1971-2: 10, 2, 22 (out of 77!). He then went to England and he remained sh!t there. Made 210 v Combined universities and that got him a game or three, HTF was a mystery and source of exasperation to a 12 year old then and remains so today.

He was the drossest sh!t. Name a player whose career was equally poor, who was equally undeserving of the chance to underwhelm, and who continued to be sh!t for ever (in Francis case, not for long, even NSW ditched him).

I think he must have had some serious dirt on Ian Chappell.

I suspect that Woodcock's big mistake was to be Greg Chappell's best man and set himself as a defacto third Chappell in a side which already had too many by two for the dreaded Sir's first preference. He also copped a bit of a Robbie Kerr - ignored for years when in form, then picked when out of it.

About the only good thing you could say about Francis's batting was it was better than his fielding. He made his partner Turner look like Pollock, and his namesake talking mule look like Sir Bob Helpmann..

McAullay as I remember got a big Emperor's New Clothes-style rave-up from George Gorrillasich, and he was about to get the Eric Freeman cap (the one you get from cricket selectors for being worryingly good at football - he was the 1972 Tassie Medallist) when he copped a nasty case of footballer's knee - while playing grade cricket in Perth. His career in both ended at that point, just as he was being fitted out for a Carlton guernsey as well as a baggy green..

all true, Fred.

Allan McGilvray was a big McAullay fan, too.

Bruce Francis - Specialist batsman with a Sheffield Shield career batting average of 27.64.

He has to be the worst cricketer ever to play test cricket for Australia.



........... unless there was some bloke back in the 19th century who only got a game because he was George Giffen's brother.

Just realised that in Francis' big game v the Vics (the 132 I thought he'd made v ROW, and the 132 that earned him a Test career), he actually made 132 out of 363 scored while he was at the wicket, and probably only made 100 because Dougie destroyed the bowlers first.

So he was sh!t ... AND a crab.

Francis, B: Shitovacrabbinghackingthunderqunt

Perhaps this thread should be renamed the Bruce Francis faecal thread?

I've never seen a sh!t as sh!t as Francis.

Hehehe, now can you just confirm the message you are trying to convey here, lardy? I'm just a little fuzzy on the gist.

Could he be the Bruce that inspired the Naked Vicar Show character - the one that Noeline Brown always told to 'piiiiiisssss offfffffffff!

Noelene would just have shot Bruce Francis. No mucking about.

She couldn't miss.