I think he did fine for his first league start and against Chelsea. We know they are not the team of old but for a kid from Brazil it may have phased him the first period of the game, I think he grew into the game but was knackered a good 10 minutes before he came off. It will take some time to get match sharp. He is really raw and do I think he was worth what we paid… probably not but We are where we are and we don’t know what he is going to do which means most defenders won’t know what he is going to do and how good is it not to be predictable Palace all the time.

I do get the concern about the defensive side of things but surely the supposedly great defence minded manager we have can work out a way to get cover so he is free to roam. I definitely don’t think it is a good idea to have him in front of Mitchell. He needs to be in the middle where he gets plenty of cover and mateta, Lerma and hughes can be in his ear more.

I said earlier he would be better on the right with Munoz behind him but maybe there is a way to sit him in front of a midfield 3 behind Mateta who is like a new player at the moment and Franca with his pace can feed off him.

Despite his failings, Franca is a teenager who speaks little English, has moved from another continent to a new style of football. I don’t remember Olise setting the world alight on his first few matches even after his injuries but he was given the chance to improve. I saw enough to give me hope that he may develop to become a decent Premier League player hopefully with us.

yes, that is my biggest concern.

Happy to give the guy time as he is young and is adapting to a new country etc, however, surely a skilful player will have a few tricks up his sleeve.
When he did get a couple of 1 on 1s opportunities he did look clueless.
At one point in the 1st half he had space in front of him to run into and almost stood still.

If we are going to play him i would prefer to see him in the Eze/No10 role as he seems more suited to that.

Completely agree - Schlupp is just about acceptable in a midfield 3, but he shouldn't be anywhere near the forward positions these days.

As you say, him Ayew and JP as a 3 is just too blunt to be a front line at this level.

Franca should be given the opportunity whilst Eze, Olise and JRS are all injured - he looks far from complete but in terms of profile is a much more suitable replacement.

For those saying Roy has been vindicated in not playing him all season by that performance;

Firstly, I don't think Franca made us a worse team at all, and if anything I'm even more baffled why he's never been given an opportunity before. Chelsea are still a team full of quality, and they have a particularly offensive RB - Franca's defensive naivety is not going to be as obvious as that in every game, and going forward he offers considerably more threat than Schlupp. He didn't look miles out of his depth by any means.

Secondly, imagine he had these sort of development opportunities from the start of the season, how much further would he be along by now? The only way to solve naivety is with experience, and Roy's unwillingness to offer him any is just as much to blame. If he was 6 months into playing at this level with regular starts and minutes, I think we'd have a real asset on our hands by now.

But Roy has no interest in developing players or finding solutions, so why bother. He has no stake in Franca's development beyond this year, so why take the 'risk' of a few mistakes along the way to aid his development... it would be someone else who benefits from that in future seasons, so no incentive to care.

Given your thoughts on Hodgson I think the question should be why did we buy Franca in the first place ?

Also worth factoring in is that Franca came to us already carrying an injury which delayed his availability until October - so not the start of the season. He's not had the opportunity to be six months into playing at this level.

Hodgson's job is to win football matches. That's his first priority, not player development. His methodology is well known. If he perceives there to be a risk in starting Franca then he's obviously not going to take it.

Hodgson's almost been forced into selecting him now, and I really hope Franca comes to be as good as we all hope he will be.

Let's also hope that Palace stay up and that with the benefit of a proper pre season under his belt, Franca makes real progress next season.

Old, Ungifted and White

I think asking why we hired a coach with no interest in young players, having spent the last however many years declaring ourselves as a club focused on developing young players, is a very good question - it’s a complete mismatch between the club and the manager, which is always going to end up being problematic.

Ok, call it four months at this level if you want - the point still stands that he could already be a lot more developed than he is.

As for the bit in bold, it his job and he’s failing miserably at it. Questions around his priorities and methodologies are perfectly valid when he is failing to do, as you correctly highlight, the main function of his job.