Why don’t we talk more about statistics?

[GUBRATS]

1 hour ago, Dunbar said:

That's like saying all that matters when you run a business is the bottom line when actually it is focusing on all the factors and levers that you can pull to effect the bottom line is what really matters.

All the best coaches will say focus on performance, not the scoreboard. 

' we ' on here aren't coaches , we're fans , you win we're happy , you lose were unhappy , then we fit whatever other incidentals into that , that's how it works 

Now if you want to ask how stats affect coaching ? , That's a completely different ball game

[Dunbar]

2 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

' we ' on here aren't coaches , we're fans , you win we're happy , you lose were unhappy , then we fit whatever other incidentals into that , that's how it works 

Now if you want to ask how stats affect coaching ? , That's a completely different ball game

Some of us enjoy discussing things in a different way to you.  Nothing wrong with that.

[Josef K]

8 hours ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

Other sports make quite a lot of use of statistics both in coaching, but also media analysis/general discussion.

I don’t see a lot of it though when we as fans discuss rugby league?

No power rankings, best defence, best attack or even individual stats etc?

What’s the reason for this do you think?

Are the RL media or fans missing a trick or is it the nature of the sport?

I like looking at the player stats when they appear on the Betfred SL site, but it’s pretty basic. 
I don’t think there are any player stats for the challenge cup, but i don’t know why not.
Some clubs don’t even like announcing their attendance for home games, so next it’ll be no more player stats, and then no FT result. 

[GUBRATS]

1 minute ago, Dunbar said:

Some of us enjoy discussing things in a different way to you.  Nothing wrong with that.

Intellectual RL fans ? , Whatever next

[LeytherRob]

4 hours ago, The Blues Ox said:

As a fan where would I even find the stats for Championship teams? At times its hard enough just to find out top try scorers.

You either wait for loverugbyleague to compile and post them, or wait for Callum Walker to plagiarize the article a few days later 

[Gerrumonside ref]

2 hours ago, Neil_Ormston said:

I organise the work of the RL Record Keepers' Club (https://stats.rugbyleaguerecords.com/), so it's fair to say, I'm a fan of stats!  One of our members sent me this link, so I thought I'd chip in with my twopen'orth

To answer the question in the OP: the root cause, as with most things, is money (or more specifically, lack of it).  This results in detailed match stats not being widely available, or adequately analysed by media / broadcasters. 

To give a more complete overview of the landscape: there's a few companies out there who gather data for rugby - the best known is Opta, although ironically they don't actually run under that name anymore (they are now Stats Perform ("SP")); they are the market leader, and forerunner in this area. Rob Lowe, their founder, has since sold the company & I believe has set up a new organisation, and we may see more of them soon; equally IMG have their own data arm, so they may be a potential source in future.  But in the UK SP have had pretty much a monopoly position, and barriers to entry are fairly high.

SP provide data to the RFL/SL, but this is not a 'real time' deal which is more expensive, so info isn't available immediate.  Those with a keen eye will have seen that RLWC2021 had a different agreement with SP and this info was available live across all 3 competitions.  As a result, broadcasters don't have access to this info, so have to employ their own people if they want any of this sort of data - this is why you only get very limited in-game data for TV games (again, you need a team of a fair few people to record this properly live, and the money isn't there).  Likewise, SL clubs employ their own analysts, and usually have 1 or 2 guys doing this, as it's a much cheaper option to do in-house - obviously this isn't publicly available.

The SP data is good, and covers most, if not all, the info that people would want to see.  However, there are then problems with public availability: the RFL / SL websites are poor, info doesn't appear in a timely fashion, there are problems with completeness, links don't work, etc - this is an issue with the websites I believe, rather than the underlying data itself; however, it essentially makes the data inaccessible.

One other point to note: each club analyst, broadcaster & SP will use different methodologies to record their stats, so you can't compare between them!  This can also mean you get different stats for the same game if covered by more than 1 source (e.g. you might see a player with a different number of tackles on Sky than in his SP data - if you can track it down!).

FWIW, on behalf of the RKC I've offered to the RFL (or strictly speaking RL Commerical) that we could host the SP data for free on our website: we could easily present this alongside our existing data, and do some fairly basic rankings and analysis, and it would at least make it available for further interpretation.  This would at least allow journalists to do more in-depth analysis, but this is a specialised area, and they may not have the expertise to do a huge amount more; as a voluntary organisation (focused on sharing a history of the sport back to 1895) the RKC wouldn't have the resource to do much more than be a conduit for the information.  I live in hope that we might be able to play a role helping to share this data though; maybe if enough people contact RL Commercial requesting it, they might be more willing to discuss my offer further, as I am awaiting a response from them here.  Regardless, I would hope that with IMG's involvement, and desire to drive fan engagement (especially with younger audiences, who have higher expectations here) we will see more development in this area soon.

 Many thanks for this detailed response which sheds a lot of light on the situation.

 

[Griff]

1 hour ago, LeytherRob said:

You either wait for loverugbyleague to compile and post them, or wait for Callum Walker to plagiarize the article a few days later 

Or you can look at the afore-mentioned Rugby League Records site.

[Adelaide Tiger]

When I was a lot younger there used to be multiple stats all through the programme.  I certainly remember 38, 24, 36 and 40, 25, 36 …….. although come to think of it, it might have been Miss World and not Eddie Waring on Grandstand going through the ages of the Widnes team!

Edited June 15, 2023 by Adelaide Tiger

[meast]

18 hours ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

Other sports make quite a lot of use of statistics both in coaching, but also media analysis/general discussion.

I don’t see a lot of it though when we as fans discuss rugby league?

No power rankings, best defence, best attack or even individual stats etc?

What’s the reason for this do you think?

Are the RL media or fans missing a trick or is it the nature of the sport?

Our sport is a good product on the field so we don't need to talk about stats to try and make it interesting

[Mathius Hellwege]

I think the image of a blue-collar sport just played in the M62-corridor will make TGG the last sport to get insightful information from stats

[Tommygilf]

2 hours ago, Mathius Hellwege said:

I think the image of a blue-collar sport just played in the M62-corridor will make TGG the last sport to get insightful information from stats

There is a kernel of truth in that. Even in football, the stats for the masses has been driven by a growing university educated, The Athletic subscribing, Football manager pro, slightly hipster/alternative style of fanbase. Of course that isn't the whole football fanbase, but a significant enough sized and wealthy enough minority to be able to prop up this sort of content commercially.

RL hasn't had that same breakthrough, mainly because it is smaller in every conceivable fashion too.

[gingerjon]

4 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Even in football, the stats for the masses has been driven by a growing university educated, The Athletic subscribing, Football manager pro, slightly hipster/alternative style of fanbase.

To an extent but there have always been stats - and especially since Sky took over, not least because they need something to talk about for an hour before the game and an hour afterwards.

There's a chapter in Football Against the Enemy - a book I would recommend to anyone at any time - about stats collection and data in the former Eastern Bloc.

[RigbyLuger]

You also need people who understand them, and the context they're in. Bit like the articles on viewing figures which reprint a number without giving any context at all to them other than "impressive."

[Griff]

3 hours ago, RigbyLuger said:

You also need people who understand them, and the context they're in. Bit like the articles on viewing figures which reprint a number without giving any context at all to them other than "impressive."

What you need first is folk to compile them.  I reckon it's a day's work, per team, to do it properly.

That wouldn't come cheap if you were paying for it.

[Dunbar]

11 hours ago, meast said:

Our sport is a good product on the field so we don't need to talk about stats to try and make it interesting

In all seriousness, and I say the following as a Rugby League lover...

I think there is a real danger with modern Rugby League that it is perceived as too repetitive and not interesting enough.  We understand that there is real tactical subtlety in the game and even every set... but to a new fan it could easily be seen as 'just' players running into each other.

So, why not play on that.  Why not use how many tackles a player makes in a game, how many runs or metres an athletic 18 stone prop makes or how fast a winger is as a point of celebration... call out how great our athletes are with the stats to back it up.  Our game is really well suited to these stats.

Some people won't be interested and that's fair enough but overs may be and there is nothing wrong with increasing your reach when it comes to (new) fans.

[The Phantom Horseman]

14 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

In all seriousness, and I say the following as a Rugby League lover...

I think there is a real danger with modern Rugby League that it is perceived as too repetitive and not interesting enough.  We understand that there is real tactical subtlety in the game and even every set... but to a new fan it could easily be seen as 'just' players running into each other.

So, why not play on that.  Why not use how many tackles a player makes in a game, how many runs or metres an athletic 18 stone prop makes or how fast a winger is as a point of celebration... call out how great our athletes are with the stats to back it up.  Our game is really well suited to these stats.

Some people won't be interested and that's fair enough but overs may be and there is nothing wrong with increasing your reach when it comes to (new) fans.

Indeed - if only because it will compare favourably with the other code. I recall where one post tweeting about an England player who had played 80 mins in an international which proudly declaredhe had made 2 carries for 1 yard, 24 tackles, 2 turnovers won and 1 lineout steal.

[GUBRATS]

11 hours ago, meast said:

Our sport is a good product on the field so we don't need to talk about stats to try and make it interesting

Exactly 

[GUBRATS]

25 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

In all seriousness, and I say the following as a Rugby League lover...

I think there is a real danger with modern Rugby League that it is perceived as too repetitive and not interesting enough.  We understand that there is real tactical subtlety in the game and even every set... but to a new fan it could easily be seen as 'just' players running into each other.

So, why not play on that.  Why not use how many tackles a player makes in a game, how many runs or metres an athletic 18 stone prop makes or how fast a winger is as a point of celebration... call out how great our athletes are with the stats to back it up.  Our game is really well suited to these stats.

Some people won't be interested and that's fair enough but overs may be and there is nothing wrong with increasing your reach when it comes to (new) fans.

That is very much my dad's interpretation of RL the ' 5 drives and a kick at the end of it ' which happens far too much 

 

[Dunbar]

7 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

Exactly 

 

2 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

That is very much my dad's interpretation of RL the ' 5 drives and a kick at the end of it ' which happens far too much 

 

Isn't there a contradiction in these two posts.

On the one hand you agree with a post saying the game on the pitch is entertaining enough and it doesn't need to be made more interesting and in the other you say an immediate family member's criticism is that it is 5 drives and a kick.

Surely we should be looking at every way we can to make our sport compelling to as wide an audience as we can.

[GUBRATS]

3 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

 

Isn't there a contradiction in these two posts.

On the one hand you agree with a post saying the game on the pitch is entertaining enough and it doesn't need to be made more interesting and in the other you say an immediate family member's criticism is that it is 5 drives and a kick.

Surely we should be looking at every way we can to make our sport compelling to as wide an audience as we can.

My dad is a lost cause , he thinks Man City are good to watch 

[Dunbar]

7 minutes ago, GUBRATS said:

My dad is a lost cause , he thinks Man City are good to watch 

I was using your dad as an example and perhaps looking to expand the conversation a tad further.  But fair enough.

Edited June 15, 2023 by Dunbar

[GUBRATS]

1 minute ago, Dunbar said:

I was using your dad as an example and perhaps looking to expand the conversation as tad further.  But fair enough.

Happily expand further , but some people just don't ' get ' RL , " people too thick to play football " is another opinion of his , having said that the last time he watched a ' live ' football game was about 55 years ago when he took me to watch Bolton

[Dunbar]

I think the point I would make is that we have to use all our tools to reach as many fans as possible.

There is a certain naivety (at best) or arrogance (at worst) in Rugby League fans who say the sport is great and all we need is people to see it and fall in love.  Well, we are 128 years old, people have had ample chance to fall in love with Rugby League. 

We have to find ways to make the sport interesting and compelling to as wide an audience as possible. 

I personally don't enjoy the short forms of Rugby League (7's and 9's) but I absolutely recognise they have a place to sell the sport. Equally, if we can find any way to make the sport interesting to new audiences around the way the game and the players are presented then we should.

[meast]

13 hours ago, Dunbar said:

In all seriousness, and I say the following as a Rugby League lover...

I think there is a real danger with modern Rugby League that it is perceived as too repetitive and not interesting enough.  We understand that there is real tactical subtlety in the game and even every set... but to a new fan it could easily be seen as 'just' players running into each other.

So, why not play on that.  Why not use how many tackles a player makes in a game, how many runs or metres an athletic 18 stone prop makes or how fast a winger is as a point of celebration... call out how great our athletes are with the stats to back it up.  Our game is really well suited to these stats.

Some people won't be interested and that's fair enough but overs may be and there is nothing wrong with increasing your reach when it comes to (new) fans.

I totally agree, my original post was slightly tongue in cheek as well.

We tend to think we are the greatest sport and everyone else should be paying attention to us etc.

I think there's some truth to that except our sport is lazily presented usually and it's fan base are a pretty negative, pessimistic bunch.