I watched the replay last night on IQ, and because I (like many others) miss a lot of good pieces of play in the normal course of watching a game, and had nothing on last night, I thought I'd take some notes on the game.

So i created a spreadsheet and put in 3 columns - great, good and error. I included my subjective view on whether a player's action was exceptional, difficult and/or crucial (great), constructive and well executed (good) or a turnover, skill error or poor defensive effort (error). I left out easy kicks in the backline or other basic skills.

It's incredibly geeky, and I've never done it before, and yes it is subjective unlike Champion Data but it does filter out a lot of meaningless stats. Unfortunately Fox Sports cut out 3 minutes in the 1st and 6 minutes in the 3rd quarter, but I found it an interesting exercise anyway.

I gave double points for "great" work and took off one point for an error

My not entirely scientific analysis came up with the following:

Net Player points
Kruezer 29 Gibbs 25 Judd 25 Houlihan 24 Fevola 22 Hadley 22 Betts 18 Murphy 16 Simpson 16
Waite 16 Jacobs 15 Robinson 15 Russell 15 Thornton 15 Joseph 13 Johnson 12 Cloke 11
Wiggins 10 Garlett 9 Bower 7 Scotland 2 Jamison 1

Kruezer was a surprise for me - knew he was good, but he had an enormous last quarter, as did Gibbs, Fev, Simpson and Robbo. Bower and Garlett were both more useful than i'd realized on Sat night, but their high error count negated their good work. With more confidence and strength, Garlett might be a genuine star. Thornton was our best player in the 1st quarter, judd and Houlihan in the second, Russell, gibbs and Kruezer were the best of a bad lot in the 3rd. Murphy and Waite scored lower than expected overall.

The merit in this highly subjective approach is that it removes "noise" from stats like those ring-a-rosy kicks and basic link-up handball (which are useful, just not important), and punishes missed tackles and spoils. They track impact and value, because our subjectivity can discern constructive play better than the raw stats sheet. Of course, the TV doesn't show all, so Scotland may have done brilliantly, but he had little impact with his actions in the play.

I noticed effective hit outs, hard ball gets and tackles more than normal, and these stats probably account for at least half the points scored. The Lions dominated the rucks in the 3rd quarter and Kruezer killed it in the last, which had a major effect on the result

It was a fun exercise and I learned something - if you have the time on your hands, well worth a try.

It's a good idea, well done! I think though that you may miss things that happen off the ball and out of camera shot, so maybe this would work if there were 22 of you at a game with each of you taking notes on an allotted player. Just a thought, but it'd be pretty rubbish just watching 1 player the whole game.

Well done...It is a great thing to do...I recently looked at the two games on TV (as I was at the games and had recorded them) and specifically was looking at the rucks.
I was wondering if our centre clearance dominance was due to better ruck work...

What I found was this:

Jacobs does an amazing job at ground level when the contested ruck drops straight down without a clear win. He will either pickup and handball (not bad for a big guy) or shepherd and push it to advantage...must admit, I wasn't aware of this at all and had only noticed Kruezer's follow up as he was usually running full pelt at it watching it at the ground.

2nd think along the same lines (that has been recognised) is Hadley's work....outstanding

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Great stuff aramari...I know you did it for your own indulgence as would most of us tragics, but thanks for sharing your system and scorecard. It says a lot, and it doesn't matter what it misses, it's another angle.

The thing about Kreuzer in the U18's before we picked him up as the No 1 player in the land was his ability to just go ballistic, forward middle and back to help his team win the game.

When he did the same against Port with 3 last Quarter goals it was dejavu.

He is an incredibly competitive athlete/ freak.

Regardless of your score card, it measures something, but the thing about Murphs and Waite, esp Murph was his gut running into space creating options just after a hard competitive hit out with the contested ball.

This is an incredible feature which the game plan has adopted, because you see it clearly that a lot of Carlton players bust a gut to run to space and create an option. And when they pass it sidewards or back (rarely) they seem to have created time so that someone (can be plural) creates an option to move forward.

I look forward to aramaris analysis for the Tigers game as well as for the upcoming Bumbers game....stay tuned.

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Russell only scored 15 so he's obviously rubbish and should be dropped IMMEDIATELY and never don the jumper again!

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Cheers guys - maybe I'll make it a regular thing, if we keep winning I might. Don't watch games twice if we're getting belted

You picked up on an issue with my approach - the seemingly straightforward uncontested mark up the wing or flank is often the result of enormous work. Impossible for us to track these little interventions, and who knows, maybe hard running and running to the right spaces is as valuable as hit out to advantage or a kick inside 50 for a mark. Personally, while I acknowledge the value of hard running, I see it as a team rule and a reflection of discipline more than a skill that impacts on the game and out-does the opposition.

Good point

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Yeah he's awful

But seriously, Scotland's lack of impact for a nominally creative half back was obviously noted by the match committee. The only possible conclusion is that my Impact Stats (TM) are an infallible measure of performance

I had to do this week's replay in three sittings, it was a labour of love this time

Net positive scores:

Judd 27 Murphy 26 Wiggins 19 Betts 16 Grigg 15 Stevens 15 Kruezer 15 Joseph 14 Jacobs 14
Houlihan 13 Cloke 12 Waite 12 Fevola 12 Gibbs 11 Johnson 8 Simpson 8 Hadley 6 Thornton 5
Robinson 5 Russell 4 Bower 1 Garlett -1

Total team net positive score: 257 (last week 338)

After seeing the game at the G I was surprised Murphy scored so highly on review but played a flawless game. Wiggins' missed a sitter but was outstanding otherwise. Grigg was just ok in his return but did a lot of nice little things. Stevens was effective with his kicking inside 50. Joseph made a few errors and was outclassed a few times but made up for it with his efforts across the game. Gibbs disappointing, Johnson's kicking was fine other than one howler but his defensive work is lacking. The rest were ineffective, Robinson 5 errors, Bower 4, Garlett horrible with 8 errors after 8 last week but little positive impact this time. Russell was the invisible man. The last 4 on the list might deserve to be dropped on the basis of that game with queries on a few others.

Judd dominated the first quarter with Murph helping. Wiggins and Joseph best in Q2. Grigg, Murphy, Cloke, Judd and Wiggins did well in Q3. Murphy and Kruezer best in the last.

A lot of good footballers scored poorly, as we know plenty of improvement in this team, but some changes need to be made. Grigg and Stevens were servicable but will be better for the run, while Kruezer showed his bravery to contribute after half time. Expect his numbers to return to 20+. If Setanta comes in Waite should be freed up to score higher while Gibbs, Simpson and Hadley would want to forget their effort and have big games next week.

good work

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Yeah but whatabout your whataboutism.

+1... really like this thread.... offers a different perspective.

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Can I ask how you scored missed goals from set shots (if you did)? If an opposition side has a good kick in strategy, a miss from a set shot or an easy running shot is really a turnover caused by an unforced error.

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Good point, I scored it an error if it was a shot that should have been a goal. Fev scored 4 errors, I think they were all from misses. Wiggo and Simmo scored errors from misses too, for example. Eddie's miss wasn't an error - in fact I think I gave him a "positive" score for his ability to create a chance.

My philosophy with this is that any AFL fan knows good football when they see it - this approach is an attempt at qualitative rather than quantitative analysis. People may have slightly different judgements on a given piece of play, but in general our instincts are right.

The problem with qualitative analysis is that to get it right you need a lot more information than with quantitative analysis, where you just categorise and count. I can't tell if a player had a better option than to shoot from 50 unless I can see it or the commentators mention it. If the commentators mention it, do I take their word for it?

The hardest thing I've found doing this is to try to filter out biases. For example, I like Chris Judd, one of the best players I've seen at Carlton. He missed a tackle another player might have made, but because he's so good, (and also because I know he has had shoulder issues, he's not the best at stretching out for tackles) my tendency is to give him a pass. The tackle wasn't effective. I marked it as an error despite initially dismissing it, because I realized that Stevens or Garlett, for various reasons (biases), would have had the error marked. It's impossible to filter out bias totally, but by being aware of it I can get close.