Maribyrnong Sports Academy Basketball student Paul Tsapatolis has signed a Category B contract with AFL club Geelong.
Having last played football for Yarraville Seddon Eagles as a 13 year old in 2015, Paul then concentrated on his basketball skills and captained Vic Metro's underage basketball sides in recent years as well as representing Australia at FIBA Oceania (2019) and Asia (2018) tournaments.
Geelong won the services of the 202cm ruck after interest was also shown by Sydney, North Melbourne and Essendon. Paul has been working with the Cats in the past year in a series of training sessions in the past 12 months after rediscovering his love for football training with the MSA AFL Program.
MSA AFL High Performance Coach Robbie Chancellor says this is an amazing opportunity for the 18yo Year 12 Student. “It’s obvious from his achievements that Paul is a talented athlete in another sport (Basketball), but has been able to get himself into a professional football environment. He is without doubt a great athlete and has given himself a chance of having a crack at Footy. With a Category B player, the club can take a punt on someone who hasn’t played football for a while and someone who has the attributes to play the game without really knowing if they can at the elite level. Paul has got himself in the door at Geelong and it is up to him to make sure he makes the most of it now.”
MSA Sports Director Mark McAllion says part of the attraction of a school like MSA is that athlete’s get the chance to see if their skills are transferable to another sport. “We have had numerous student athlete’s make the transition from one sport to another and Paul is another athlete who has been able to do so. Monique Conti was in our Basketball Program and made the World Starting 5 at the FIBA U17 Championships before going on to become an AFLW player with the Bulldogs and now Richmond. Guy Walker was in the high performance pathway for Cricket before being picked up by Melbourne in the AFL while Wilson Berry played VFL football for Essendon and is now a Gridiron College Punter in the States, just to name a few. Our focus here at MSA is to work with the Athlete and give them the tools to perform at the elite level in their chosen sport.”