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Statistics

Galbraith

Academy Player
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May 13, 2013
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England
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England
Everyone is always talking about statistics like tackles completed and metres made, but I dont have any idea where these people get this information from, is there a particular website or something which shows statistics for rugby matches or do people just go off small snippets of stats that are shown in articles like I am currently?

Thanks in advance
 
Check ESPN they have their own "match pack" which has a lot of stats from the televised games instantly, and from the non-televised games by Monday at the latest.
The ESPN ones are reasonably accurate, you can certainly build up a picture of someones' play over a number of games.

OPTA supply the official stats that broadcasters and journos use (teams as well I think?) but you have to pay for those.
 
Ah right thanks a lot thats what I was after, Im really interested to see how everyones statistics match up in the aviva prem this season
 
Take them with a pinch of salt though. They don't have even a quarter of the data you need to actually read into them. In the best case, they are incomplete, and in the worst, misleading.

A few examples:

- A player with an insane meters run stat often didn't do it through strong carrying, but rather because they ran kicks back. This is why Ben Morgan often makes for good stat reading: he's one of the few 8s that will regularly drop into the back 3 to make the carry.

- Sometimes, a player can miss a tackle or two and put in a better defensive performance than a player that makes 100% of tackles. 20/2 makes better reading for a flanker than 5/0 for example. Also, players that blitz out of the line and miss the tackle can disrupt ball carriers enough so that a following team mate nails the next tackle, beyond the gain line. In this case, the speed out of the line of the first attempted tackle has to be noted.

- When comparing player against player, it's hard to compare number of tackles/lineouts won etc. For example, Gloucester made 2/3 of the tackles Northampton did after the first four rounds. If you compared Kvesic and Wood's tackle count, you'd have to bear in mind that Kvesic wouldn't be expected to make as many tackles as Wood.

- Often, teams with the better scrum "lose more" of their ball in the stats. This is because the team struggling in the scrum often aim to get the ball out asap and not give the team a chance for a turn over. They could "win" all of their put-ins with sloppy service for the backline. Comparatively, the stronger team aims to keep the ball in the scrum. Once or twice in the game, this may mean losing the ball. However, the longer the ball is in the scrum, the longer the dominating team have to push around the other team, and they can win good possession and penalties. So for example, team A may win/lose 10/2 of their put-ins whereas team B win/lose 11/0, but team A wins 6 penalties on their 10 successful put-ins, whereas team B win 0. This is why I think ESPN should have the scrum stats as won/lost/penalties won. The example would now read 10/2/6 and 11/0/0, and you could tell that team A was better in the scrum.

To put things in perspective:
Gloucester have won 80% of their scrums
Bath have won 78%
Leicester have won 76%
Saracens have won 74%
Northampton have won 73%
 
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Right yeah I agree, good well explained arguments by the way, I dont really rate Jeremy Guscott as a pundit because he is obsessed with them which leads him to make conclusions like Strettle should be in the England team and arguments about Alex Goode being good.
 
I was going to mention that page^

...but, they haven't updated it since the end of last season.
 

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