The Tuesday Top 5

With the Wallabies announcement imminent, today we take a look at the back rowers and who might make the squad. We also try and take focus off how poorly things are being handled by the powers that be, by grading the teams, finding some good in amongst the bad and ugly, checking in on our Aussies abroad who are playing in finals over in Europe and get stuck into some stats.

Report Card

Reds D-: Discipline. Do I need to say it again? According to the Courier Mail “Top referee Rohan Hoffmann has been a conspicuous on-field extra at Reds training twice this week in a move by coach Nick Stiles to instil more disciplined habits”. Well it didn’t bloody work, did it! I believe it was the breakdown and offside they focused on? Maybe they should have focused on better tackle technique instead given the number of high tackles (or you know, catching and passing, which really doesn’t require the presence of a referee, just a half decent coach?)

Force B-: The Force did well against the Reds, their forwards were superior and they wasted less ball. Penalties proved to be the difference, 4 penalty goals to the Force getting them across the line. The stats show that they were pretty on par with the Reds, aside from penalties, 11 to the Reds, 6 to the Force, but they took better advantage of their chances.

Waratahs C: They were a little unlucky with a few dubious reffing calls, but they still couldn’t match it with the Highlanders. The stats are pretty close, but a few key areas made sure that the Tahs would finish 2^nd in this match. 17 clean breaks to the Highlanders to 10, and 10 turnovers won to 3. They need to tighten up their work at the breakdown to prevent quick turnovers by the opposition.

Rebels D: The rebels showed some great intent in attack and scored a couple of good tries as a result. The score line, while a big loss, is a lot more respectable than many expected and certainly wasn’t a blow-out. They pressured the Crusaders into handling errors, which kept the score a lot closer than it could have been.

Brumbies A-: The Brumbies finally got their attack working and scored some lovely tries, even utilising some clever kicks. Their defence was mostly solid and the number of handling errors was greatly reduced on previous weeks.

Just as an added fun fact – the Brumbies win made it the first time all season an Aussie team has had 2 wins in a row.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Good This week we saw something that we hadn’t seen for a while … all Australian teams scoring tries. And not just one or 2. The 5 teams between them scored 21 tries this week, that’s an average of 4 each. A far sight better than some weeks where we have remained in single digits.

Bad Unfortunately to go with that, Australian teams let in 22 tries between them. So while we may be improving on attack, our defence still has some way to go.

Ugly McMahon’s injury. I don’t think I need to say more.

Back to Europe

As I mentioned last week, the finals of both the Aviva Premiership and Guinness Pro 12 were held over the weekend.

Exeter Chiefs took out the Aviva 23-20 over the Wasps in a thrilling match which went into extra time. Chiefs Captain, Gareth Steenson, slotted a penalty at 79 minutes to tie up the game, pushing it into extra time. Then, after 17 minutes of extra play he again kicked a crucial penalty, giving the Chiefs the win.

The Pro 12 final was a much more one-sided affair, with Scarlets scoring 6 tries to 3, defeating Munster 46-22. Munster never really looked likely to take the match, trailing 29-3 after 30 minutes and 29-10 at half time. It wasn’t until the 74^th minute when Munster would score again, crossing for 2 late tries and making the score-line look a little more presentable.

This coming weekend Toulon will face Clermont in the French Top 14 decider. Toulon has had a rough year, with it looking unlikely at times that they would even make the finals – remember when we reported that the team had their holidays cancelled because of a poor result? They have also been through 3 coaches in 12 months (Diego Domingue was sacked in October, Mike Ford left by “mutual consent” in April and currently Richard Cockerill is in charge until Fabien Galthie takes over next season – perhaps some Australian franchises need to take note of the success that has come since getting rid of the coaches who haven’t been getting results).

Likely to play for Toulon in the final are Drew Mitchell, James O’Çonnor, Liam Gill and Matt Giteau while ex Brumbies and Waratahs front rower John Ulugia is a possible to make the Clermont team.

What are the stats telling us?

So we all know how all the Aussie teams have been traveling – or do we?

The current script we have all been reading from says:

• Brumbies can’t score tries
• Force is struggling in attack and are really hit or miss
• Rebels seem to doing a lot; but nothing to show from their efforts
• Reds have discipline issue and are lacking cohesion and direction
• Tahs have discipline issues and are suffering from turnstile defence.

So looking at the stats below do they reflect the stories?

Some of the key points the stats are telling us:

• The only team on the positive side of the try count is the Brumbies
• The Reds and Tahs seem to have similar disciple problems
• Tahs are scoring plenty but leak plenty more then they score.
• Reds and Tahs are similar in a lot of stats.
• Brumbies defence is really tight

Some interesting numbers:

• Look at the Tahs attacking stats v defence. Are they preoccupied with one at the expense of the other?
• The Reds stats are really interesting as they don’t really point to a key issue. This suggests that it’s a game plan issue; all the ingredients are there but the mix is just not working.
• The Force seem to be working hard and improving but still are maybe being conservative and lacking in attack. It appears that the old habits of bashing it up might be stunting their progress a little.
• The Rebels stats are akin to kids hopped up on red cordial having a free for all … lots going on, but none of it actually doing anything.

One for me that I find an interesting measure is the error rates of the teams. With risk comes errors but apparently so can reward.

• The average errors per team so far this season
  • Australian teams – 130.6
  • Kiwi teams  –          137.4

Would be Wallabies

With the announcement of the Wallaby squad tonight, and anywhere between 30-50 players expected to be named (depending on who you talk to), I thought I’d take a look at a few positions there has been some discussion over … the back row.

So let’s have a look at the stats comparing some of those who might possibly be in the mix for a Gold jersey.

** I have not included some players who have not played enough matches as the stats wouldn’t really be comparative.

** Yes, I know stats don’t tell the whole story, and the type of game plan teams put in to play has a big impact on how players perform their roles. But hey, it’s an interesting read anyway.

Number 6.

A tough one to call. Fardy has performed well but is leaving at the end of the season, usually players that are leaving don’t get picked. But looking for another number 6 to compare him to was tricky, between player injuries and internationals who aren’t eligible for the Wallabies. Mumm was the obvious choice, as he was there for the Wallabies, but has been playing lock for the Tahs. So I threw in Ned Hanigan to see how it would look.

Hanigan is obviously more of an attacking 6 with more run metres and defenders beaten, while Fardy is a real threat at the breakdown and in defence.

Number 7.

Now to the 7’s. We all know who will be selected, but it is still interesting to compare.

So the stats look to lean pretty heavily in Hooper’s favour, though he does have the lowest tackle success rate. It is interesting to note, however, how many more minutes he has played than the other 7’s. For example, Hooper has made 2 more tackles than Alcock, but has played for an extra 219 minutes. That’s close to 4 hours, or 2 ¾ rugby matches. Same with defenders beaten. On average Hooper beats 2.25 defenders per match, Alcock beats 2. Marginal difference.

Number 8.

Now this is an interesting one. With Pocock playing 8 last season for the Wallabies, and McCalman and McMahon injured it is a wide open (you’d think) race. So who are the contenders?

Clearly Higginbotham is leading the charge here, but it looks like we could have a bolter in Hardwick from the Force, especially when you consider he has played far fewer (ie 300) minutes than Higgers, for stats that are fairly comparable.

And I thought I’d throw this in just to make us all go “crap … I wish he was eligible for us”.

So there you go. Any last-minute changes of opinion for who should/shouldn’t be in the squad? I guess we will have to wait and see.