PhilClinton
Mark Loane (55)
Yep - big difference between aerobic and anaerobic fitness and game styles
Skills are really most easily transferred in maybe a couple of positions e.g. wingers run fast, WRs run fast
Australian Rugby / RA
- Thread starter Dave Beat
- Start date
Yep - big difference between aerobic and anaerobic fitness and game styles
Skills are really most easily transferred in maybe a couple of positions e.g. wingers run fast, WRs run fast
LeCheese
Greg Davis (50)
Makes the decision to switch rugby from a Term 2 sport (competing with soccer) to a Term 3 sport (competing with basketball) in QLD GPS schools a bit interesting.
John S
Peter Fenwicke (45)
Ronan O'Gara: La Rochelle head coach suspended for 10 weeks, his fourth ban in a year
La Rochelle head coach and former Ireland fly-half Ronan O'Gara is given a fourth suspension in a year after being banned for 10 weeks.
www.bbc.com
Can't remember which thread someone was mentioning to get Ronan O'Gara as coach? (Or did I misread it?) - might not be the best - we've already got one Rassie in the Southern Hemisphere.
The Ghost of Raelene
David Codey (61)
40 men down: ‘Alarming’ Wallabies injury toll to be reviewed
The Wallabies will finish their season against Wales with coach Dave Rennie needing to draw upon almost his entire spring tour squad to field a team.
You don't play Summer sports for terms 1 and 4 and Winter sports for terms 2 and 3?
LeCheese
Greg Davis (50)
Nah, 4 terms = 4 different sets of sports (aside from preseason stuff). Rugby used to be in Term 2, but was moved to better accomodate a large number wanting to play both soccer and rugby, and also to make field logistics easier
The_Brown_Hornet
John Eales (66)
One term of rugby. Wow. Do the boys get a chance to play club footy in T2?
The PSA comp my boy played in over here in Perth had rugby in T2/3.
The PSA comp my boy played in over here in Perth had rugby in T2/3.
Weird. Does anyone know if that is now the case in NSW too?
How many games can you play? We used to play 10 in a season across term 2 and 3 and that was a very short season.
How many games can you play? We used to play 10 in a season across term 2 and 3 and that was a very short season.
The Ghost of Raelene
David Codey (61)
In NSW Rugby is across Term 2/3 along with other winter sports like Soccer. Term 1/4 is Summer for Cricket, Basketball, Rowing, Tennis etc..
LeCheese
Greg Davis (50)
Yeah, but usually there's significant overlap between club and school seasons.
Excl. any trials, 9 rounds for 8 GPS games (one vs each other school + a bye where some schools/teams will schedule a game against a non-GPS school)
Doesn't give much time for a preseason if it's all in one term!
LeCheese
Greg Davis (50)
Preseason work usually starts in the previous term for the older and/or higher-grade teams, but a rugby camp held in June/July holidays kicks the season off for most. A bit school-dependent too
Derpus
Nathan Sharpe (72)
Ah yes the glorious sport of chess.
Rugby was the only sport I had any interest in so me and my mates picked up chess to tick the box in years 11 and 12. I'll never forget winning the solitary game of chess anyone from our cohort won all year.
Probably my proudest moment.
It was on Friday afternoons in my day and wasn't a replacement for Saturday sport.
Also, I steadfastly believe it's not a sport.
Derpus
Nathan Sharpe (72)
Yeah the way I figure it the easiest way to delineate between a game and a sport is that a sport must have a physical competency element to it which is relied on for an advantage.
Agreed.
I'm putting this here because it deals with passed, current and future coaching chat.
Ben Darwin has been saying recently, judging coach success purely on wins and losses isn't accurate, because it doesn't take in to account games expected to win and lose. Ben's team obviously has a lot more detailed data here around team make ups and cohesion etc, but I've had a go at coming up with my own (somewhat limited) method.
It's based on World Rugby Ranking Points (the actual points, not the rank) including taking into account their home v away weighting (home team gets an extra 3 points), you could go back to when the ratings started (RWC2003 albeit based on results through the history of the game) you can start developing a different perspective on success.
For instance, when we played Ireland in that RWC, we had a "Pre Match Rating" of 84.76 and Ireland had 84.95. If you give us the home ground rating we go to 87.76 and we become favorites. We actually won the game so that is an "Expected Win".
Two games later, we played NZL. We had a PMR of 89.20 (with home ground weighting) and they had 90.41, so NZL were expected to win. We obviously won - so that's an "Unexpected Win" or an "Upset".
In the final game of the tournament we played Eng and we had a PMR of 91.44 (weighted) v ENG's 92.13. So they were favorites, they won and it was an "Expected Loss". You get the idea.
Apply that against all games played and we can see how each of our coaches have gone since the rankings were first published.
For instance Eddie, from that first RWC game onwards, had 32 games. 21 of those games we were 'expected to win' yet we only one 16 (76.19% Favorites Win Rate). 11 of those games we were expected to lose, yet we won 4 (36.36% Upset Rate).
All up, in the games Eddie coached in this period, he was expected to win 65.63% of them. In reality he only won 62.5% of his games so is overall sits at -3.13% Performance Success Rate (For want of a better term).
@Braveheart81 may be interested to note how I deal with draws. If Australia was expected to lose, but snagged a draw I declared that an Upset. If Australia was expected to win, but drew, then I declared that a 'loss'.
So to compare against coaches:
"Favorites Win Rate"
1st John Connolly @ 88.24% (won 15 of the 17 games he was expected to win)
2nd Ewen McKenzie @ 84.62
3rd Eddie Jones @ 76.19%
4th Michael Cheika @ 75%
5th Robbie Deans @ 74.36%
6th Dave Rennie @ 40%
"Upset Rate"
1st Robbie Deans @ 47.06% (won 16 of the 34 games he was expected to lose)
2nd Dave Rennie @ 36.84%
3rd Eddie Jones @ 36.36%
4th Michael Cheika @ 25%
5th John Connolly @ 12.50%
6th Ewen McKenzie @ 11.11%
Performance Success Rate
1st Robbie Deans 8.22% (was expected to win 54.42% of games, actually won 61.64%)
2nd Michael Cheika -1.47%
3rd Eddie Jones -3.13%
4th John Connolly -4%
5th Ewen McKenzie -4.55%
6th Dave Rennie -5.88%
This of course makes the usual assumption that my stats are accurate.
Some observations:
- Robbie Deans remains underrated for his success as a Wallaby coach. His ability to deliver upsets was exceptional.
- Rennie has just had his best year with the Wallabies, which isn't hard but does show improvement. He only lost 1 game that he was expected to win (Italy) and actually managed to win 4 games he wasn't expected to win.
Ok for fun, Top 5 upsets by us (ranked by biggest rating point differential)
1 v SAF (2021) with a differential of 9.38 (85.11 v 94.49)
2 v NZL (2010) = 9.21
3 v NZL (2007) = 7.25
4 v NZL (2017) = 6.93
4 v NZL (2019) = 6.62
And, not so fun, Top 5 upsets against us
1 v SCO (2012) with a differential of 17.13 (90.99 v 73.86)
2 v SAM (2011) = 16.56
3 v ARG (2018) = 10.42
4 v IRE (2011) = 10.34
5 v ARG (2014) = 10.09
Ben Darwin has been saying recently, judging coach success purely on wins and losses isn't accurate, because it doesn't take in to account games expected to win and lose. Ben's team obviously has a lot more detailed data here around team make ups and cohesion etc, but I've had a go at coming up with my own (somewhat limited) method.
It's based on World Rugby Ranking Points (the actual points, not the rank) including taking into account their home v away weighting (home team gets an extra 3 points), you could go back to when the ratings started (RWC2003 albeit based on results through the history of the game) you can start developing a different perspective on success.
For instance, when we played Ireland in that RWC, we had a "Pre Match Rating" of 84.76 and Ireland had 84.95. If you give us the home ground rating we go to 87.76 and we become favorites. We actually won the game so that is an "Expected Win".
Two games later, we played NZL. We had a PMR of 89.20 (with home ground weighting) and they had 90.41, so NZL were expected to win. We obviously won - so that's an "Unexpected Win" or an "Upset".
In the final game of the tournament we played Eng and we had a PMR of 91.44 (weighted) v ENG's 92.13. So they were favorites, they won and it was an "Expected Loss". You get the idea.
Apply that against all games played and we can see how each of our coaches have gone since the rankings were first published.
For instance Eddie, from that first RWC game onwards, had 32 games. 21 of those games we were 'expected to win' yet we only one 16 (76.19% Favorites Win Rate). 11 of those games we were expected to lose, yet we won 4 (36.36% Upset Rate).
All up, in the games Eddie coached in this period, he was expected to win 65.63% of them. In reality he only won 62.5% of his games so is overall sits at -3.13% Performance Success Rate (For want of a better term).
@Braveheart81 may be interested to note how I deal with draws. If Australia was expected to lose, but snagged a draw I declared that an Upset. If Australia was expected to win, but drew, then I declared that a 'loss'.
So to compare against coaches:
"Favorites Win Rate"
1st John Connolly @ 88.24% (won 15 of the 17 games he was expected to win)
2nd Ewen McKenzie @ 84.62
3rd Eddie Jones @ 76.19%
4th Michael Cheika @ 75%
5th Robbie Deans @ 74.36%
6th Dave Rennie @ 40%
"Upset Rate"
1st Robbie Deans @ 47.06% (won 16 of the 34 games he was expected to lose)
2nd Dave Rennie @ 36.84%
3rd Eddie Jones @ 36.36%
4th Michael Cheika @ 25%
5th John Connolly @ 12.50%
6th Ewen McKenzie @ 11.11%
Performance Success Rate
1st Robbie Deans 8.22% (was expected to win 54.42% of games, actually won 61.64%)
2nd Michael Cheika -1.47%
3rd Eddie Jones -3.13%
4th John Connolly -4%
5th Ewen McKenzie -4.55%
6th Dave Rennie -5.88%
This of course makes the usual assumption that my stats are accurate.
Some observations:
- Robbie Deans remains underrated for his success as a Wallaby coach. His ability to deliver upsets was exceptional.
- Rennie has just had his best year with the Wallabies, which isn't hard but does show improvement. He only lost 1 game that he was expected to win (Italy) and actually managed to win 4 games he wasn't expected to win.
Ok for fun, Top 5 upsets by us (ranked by biggest rating point differential)
1 v SAF (2021) with a differential of 9.38 (85.11 v 94.49)
2 v NZL (2010) = 9.21
3 v NZL (2007) = 7.25
4 v NZL (2017) = 6.93
4 v NZL (2019) = 6.62
And, not so fun, Top 5 upsets against us
1 v SCO (2012) with a differential of 17.13 (90.99 v 73.86)
2 v SAM (2011) = 16.56
3 v ARG (2018) = 10.42
4 v IRE (2011) = 10.34
5 v ARG (2014) = 10.09
D-Box
Cyril Towers (30)
It would be interesting if someone has the time to see at what point spread value on the rankings you historically have a greater than 75% chance of winning and run a similar analysis. For instance there is currently <1.5 points seperating Aus, Scotland and Argentina and I would think that any game between those three teams would be a toss up.
England at two point above you would probably put money on beating these three and Wales two point below the group you would probably expect to lose, but not overly surprised if the game went the other way. You then go up to a seven point gap to the group of top nations. I don't think anyone but the most optimistic fans is really backing any sort of upset there
England at two point above you would probably put money on beating these three and Wales two point below the group you would probably expect to lose, but not overly surprised if the game went the other way. You then go up to a seven point gap to the group of top nations. I don't think anyone but the most optimistic fans is really backing any sort of upset there