I play around with numbers and statistics for a living and had a few minutes spare so thought I'd have a look at the for/against numbers that Parra have pulled since the 2009 season to paint a picture of exactly where we are.
A picture paints a thousand words
The chart has been shrunk a little, see the fullsize version here: http://i.imgur.com/jpErI2X.png
To explain it for those not familiar with the numbers. The faint solid orange/blue lines in the background are the actual for/against scores for all games since 2009. The dashed green/red lines are the rolling 5-game average scores (basically it smooths out the performance to take away the impact of once-off big scores). Red is bad (points against), green is good (points for).
What we want to see is the Green line on top of the Red line and the more distance in between them, the better. What we actually see is the Red line on top of the Green line (mostly) and it has been growing and widening for years. Most notably under Stuart.
So to break down the sections by coach:
The Anderson Years
As you can see we have our run to the '09 GF in there (big green spike) but if we net out that entire time the red/green lines are very close together. This is a gritty team. Not a world beater, but a competitor. And when you run with momentum a team like this can achieve great things (as we did in '09). The data shows a very small dip in Points For which was the cause of Andersons undoing - but our defence (points against) stayed under control until...
The Kearney Years
Our attack stayed the same, didn't improve, didn't get dramatically worse. The green line tends to hover with a slight downward slope. But nothing that can't be fixed. The defence however, OUCH! Look at that red line climb. This is where the big scores against us started. Big scores. Remember this is a weighted rolling average so when you see it move up, it means we're really copping it badly!
The Arthur Interim
Arthur stepped in for a little while. Not enough points to mean much. The team certainly performed better, but was it playing for their careers? Was it "nothing left to lose"? It was too short a time to draw conclusions for. But it was definitely the closest to Anderson we'd had in a long time.
The Stuart Experiment
I was surprised by just how bad the data showed Stuarts time at the club. If you'd asked me I would've said that Kearney was the one who did the most damage, but looking at the data it shows a wild swing in both for and against points - both in the wrong direction. That one year statistically turned the Eels from a mediocre team into a team so far behind the rest of the pack that it's amazing we even won a few games. It continually got worse and worse on both fronts, attack and defence.
Now what?
Well I certainly don't have the answers, but this does paint a picture of exactly the trend that Arthur has to reverse, and just how deeply entrenched this trend is. This is a serious, growing issue that has been trending significantly since Anderson was first removed and was greatly exacerbated during Stuarts year.
Of course I'm not trying to say this is all down to the coach, but by overlaying the coaches it does become clear that there is a correlation between team performance and a coach change - each coach has a distinct profile that you can see from the data.
Hopefully, before focusing on winning, we can start to close this gap again. If we lose, lose close. Because the culture that seems to be continually growing was demonstrated perfectly in the game last week.
I might do some more data diving if I get some time later in the week, there's some pretty fascinating stats out there.
Replies
Cheers Captain, thanks for taking the time to share with us. Very interesting and alarming, i would like it if you added to this at season end to compare.
Will do, I'll keep the data up to date. Hopefully I get some good news to add in there this season!! *fingers crossed*
Totally agree Whayne, BA will need time to turn this around, one off season is not enough. Even though im a bonafide unicorn this chart just shows how bad things have gotten and how much hard work the boys and BA need to do to buck the trend.
Captain, great stats. A picture is worth a thousand words!
Here would be the controversial way to interpret the graph.... are the players who have been there through the 'rise' to mediocrity most culpable? To what extent is the team's performance a reflection of team leaders who have been there through this increasingly poor performance history? I was led to think such questions watching Hayne spit the dummy at the end of the first half against the Rorters. Yes, a try was bombed. But this team continually gives up the ghost, and Hayne's theatrics was like watching a player say "there is our chance gone". But a full half of footy remained. Can a team perform if it's leader(s) are spitting the dummy? Is the graph telling us something more than just a statistical tale?
Nice work Captain...good analysis. Kind of reminds me of this graph i seen the other week tho...
Cheers,
Nice data... some significant peaks there... unfortunately they are pretty much all orange, not blue!
Of course there are countless other variables but it does paint a picture of not too much wrong with what DA was doing and the Grand Canyon between for and against commenced with the appointment of 'Lads'. Eased a bit as BA tightened things then wooshka... the little garden gnome bastard from Canberra set about making a bigger gap than even Lads.
BA has one heck of an assignment - he needs the time afforded to him to complete it.
As per previous comments, thanks captain.
Really does show the depths we sunk to last year, and highlights what a massive turn-around is required.
For me it's all about momentum, and hopefully we have more of the good stuff than the bad stuff this year.
It also shows we can't just concentrate on fixing one of the problems, ie defence, how you attack has an effect on your defence, the more attacking you do from gaining repeat sets, scoring tries, recieving penalties and controling field position the less time you need to defend and under less pressure. Saturdays game against the Roosters was a prime example, our mistakes, penalties conceded and slow service from dummy half made it imposible to gain ground putting more and more pressure on our defence that just could not hold the well drilled Roosters attack.
We need to be more adventurous with the ball than just one out hit ups, our kicking game needs to be much better and we need 2 hookers to take advantage of the speed of the game and the way it is headed or we will be left behind again.
We need to recruit some forwards that have an offload or can pass before the line.
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