With Round 14 complete it’s time to look at one of my advanced statistics, Run %. For those new to the site, I’d recommend reading this post on Run % which details how it is calculated and how to use it. To summarise, it estimtes the percentage of runs that a player made during his time on the field, adjusted for an estimate of how many times thier team had the ball. After all, you can only run the ball if you team possesses it. More possessions usually equates to more runs. The idea behind it is that most statistics...
Continue reading...Advanced Statistics
The rule change affecting time in play that’s rarely talked about – NRL Round 14 2020 stats and trends
One of the things I’ve noticed over the past few rounds is that the average time of ball in play has dropped slightly to the pre Rugby League 2.0 levels. This comes after a decent increase earlier in the season once the rules were changed. Focusing just on time in possession, the last NRL three rounds haven’t had more than 57 minutes of ball in play, the three lowest rounds this season and both before V’Landysball was introduced in Round 3. This led me to investigating why, and I put together the below chart plotting time in possession (sourced from...
Continue reading...NRL Round 13 advanced statistics – Involvement Rate
Involvement Rate is an advanced statistic for rugby league that I created to identify players who have a high workload but don’t play a lot of minutes. Traditional rugby league statistics are counting stats and volume based, and the important work of middle and interchange forwards goes largely unrecognised. If you’re new to the site and want to understand how it works, I would recommend reading this post on Involvement Rate. To put it simply, it is a combination of Run % and Tackle % which shows the estimated percentage of plays that someone completed a run or tackle during...
Continue reading...NRL Round 13 advanced stats – Tackle %
Tackle % is on of three advanced statistics that I’ve created to look at player performance throughout the NRL season. If you’re new to the site, I’d recommend reading this post on Tackle %, which explains how it works and why I think it’s an imporant statistic for identifying high motor middle and interchange forwards. The idea behind it is that most tackle statistics you see are just based on volume, and mainly highlight players like Jake Friend who make a massive amount of tackles or play large minutes. Most middle forwards and interchange players play limited minutes and wouldn’t...
Continue reading...NRL Round 13 advanced statistics – Run %
With Round 13 complete it’s time to look at one of my advanced statistics, Run %. For those new to the site, I’d recommend reading this post on Run % which details how it is calculated and how to use it. To summarise, it estimtes the percentage of runs that a player made during his time on the field, adjusted for an estimate of how many times thier team had the ball. After all, you can only run the ball if you team possesses it. More possessions usually equates to more runs. The idea behind it is that most statistics...
Continue reading...Does a high volume of possession in opponents halves result in more points? – NRL Round 14 2020 stats and trends
On Saturday, the Storm defeated the Bulldogs 41-10 at Sunshine Coast Stadium. Perusing the stats, I noticed that the Bulldogs actually had more possession in their opponents 20 metre area than the Storm, with 38 play the balls inside 20 compared to Melbourne’s 28. Yet they were outscored by 30 points. This made me wonder if how strong the connection was with the amount of possessions inside an opponents half with the number of points scored. To do this we will look at where teams are playing the ball and if that correlates to points being scored. As usual, I’m...
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