BOTH coaches involved in Sunday's Showdown have denied accusations made by a former Port Adelaide player that the Power are 'soft'.

In an interview on radio station 5AA, former Port Adelaide midfielder Josh Francou questioned his old side's attack on the ball in last weekend's game against the Swans.

Crows coach Neil Craig reacted with surprise when he was told of Francou's comments at today's press conference ahead of this weekend's Showdown.

"Really?" Craig said. "Go back and have a look at all the Showdowns and tell me whether you think Port Adelaide is soft at the ball.

"Go back and have a look at a side that, last year, got into a Grand Final with the profile of their squad; you can't get into a Grand Final being soft at the ball.

"Lets talk a bit of reality here."

Power coach Mark Williams said he wouldn't disregard Francou's opinions and openly acknowledged that contested football was an area his club would continue to improve on.

"At no time since I've been coaching have we spent more time on [contested footy]," he said.

"I reckon most clubs do one-on-one drills with pads – we do it against people. Most clubs don't put their players at risk during training – we do.

"We don't think were the best team at it and that's why we spend so much time doing it.

Williams also put the club's 0-2 start into perspective.

"If you think of the two games that we've played this year, we nearly beat Geelong and if anyone here watched the last half, they would've seen that we had opportunities to do that.

"The Swans in Sydney is always tough for us and it proved to be again. I think they kicked seven goals in the last seven minutes of the third quarter, which wrecked the game for us, but apart from that we weren't too bad.

"We reached such great heights last year that everyone wants to keep comparing it to that, but we know we're in a development phase and we're going to stick with our young players and keep working with them."