AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Round 3 2020

This week: the Kangaroos record one of the biggest AFLW wins ever, St. Kilda records its first AFLW win ever, and Collingwood somehow does not win despite recording almost 100 more disposals than its opponents.

The Kangaroos have a thumping good win

The Kangaroos jump to a clear second on the rankings, after beating Richmond by 56 points on the weekend. It was the fourth largest winning margin in AFLW history, behind the Bulldogs’ 73 point win against Carlton in 2018, and the twin beltings Adelaide handed out to Melbourne and Geelong in consecutive weeks last season. One may note that both those teams went on to win the premiership.

The margin would not have been so severe if the Tigers had converted their shots at goal at an average rate, but the Kangaroos still dominated the match with 63 more disposals. They were excellent at finding loose players (or conversely, the Tigers were poor at covering their opponents), with 45 more uncontested possessions than Richmond, and almost double the amount of marks. Ashleigh Riddell and Jasmine Garner continued their great form – Riddell is averaging 20 disposals for the year, up from 13 per game last season, while Garner is averaging 18 disposals per game, also up from 13 last year.

At the same stage last season the Kangaroos were red-hot favourites for the flag. Big losses to Adelaide and Fremantle – along with the AFLW’s conference system – ultimately ended their season. Each round this year seems to throw up a new premiership favourite (and the Roos aren’t quite the bookmakers’ favourite), but the Kangaroos in 2020 look like they are still one of the competition’s strongest sides.

Don’t sleep on Collingwood, despite their loss in the west

Collingwood, along with Brisbane, is one of the most improved teams in the AFLW this season. The Magpies easily beat West Coast and Carlton, and lost by just three points to league leaders Fremantle on the weekend. Scoreboard aside though Collingwood statistically dominated this game, with 93 more disposals, 13 more inside 50s, and 19 tackles in their forward 50. Hayley Miller was Fremantle’s leading disposal-getter with 13; six Magpies had more than that, including Jaimee Lambert with 32 disposals.

The Dockers again won the game through their general pressure, with 75 tackles to 58, and gaining more territory than the Magpies with each disposal. Fremantle had 2.8 kicks to every handball, compared to 1.2 for Collingwood. Throw in a better conversion rate in front of goal, and the Dockers were able to squeak home.

But this was still an encouraging result for the Magpies on enemy turf. It could end up being a dogfight with Carlton and Melbourne (or even the Dockers themselves, if they slip) for the second and third Conference B finals spots. Next week’s match against the Demons at Marvel Stadium, before the men’s fundraiser game for the bushfires, looms as an important one for the make-up of the finals series.

Congratulations to the Saints

St. Kilda won its first ever AFLW match, against Melbourne, on the back of a booming fourth-quarter goal from Caitlin Greiser. Melbourne’s inaccuracy in front of goal (1.8) probably helped get the Saints over the line, but that shouldn’t take away from the joy of St. Kilda’s historic win, coming after a near miss against reigning premiers Adelaide. Next week they face off against the Dockers, for which the rankings consider them an almost even chance, and how many people would have thought that at the start of the season?

AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Round 2 2020

Western Derby: Bowers gets her hooks into Dana

Watching the first AFLW match between West Coast and Fremantle, played in front of over 35,000 fans, there seemed to be a feeling of payback in the Dockers’ 45 point win over their new cross-town rivals. Seven former Dockers lined up for the Eagles, including former fairest and best winner Dana Hooker. Fremantle laid a massive 78 tackles on West Coast, and Roxy Roux’s celebration after slotting through a goal seemed to sum up the joy they got in showing they are the premier team in the west.

Eighteen of those tackles were from Kiara Bowers, who comfortably led the league in tackles and pressure points last season, and was runner-up in the Most Valuable Player award. Bowers kept Hooker quiet early, and while Hooker ended up with the same number of disposals as Bowers (13) for the match, the Dockers had well and truly skipped ahead by the time she started finding the ball. Katie-Jayne Grieve had 11 tackles as well (and two goals), a big step up from the 2.4 tackles per game she averaged last year.

The Dockers in general have built their game on pressure, and kicking the ball long. Freo recorded only four more disposals than West Coast in the match, but had 16 more kicks, and 30 to 19 inside 50s. Carlton surprised them in the finals last year, but the Dockers are looking like they will again be among the contenders to make it to the final week this season.

The Demons also play like a contender

There was a happier result for a player against her old club this week, as Libby Birch and her new team Melbourne beat comfortably beat their original rivals the Western Bulldogs. The Dogs seemed to enjoy getting stuck into Birch even more than the Dockers got into their ex-teammates. With Birch in the side the Demons’ defence has been much stronger so far this year, conceding just two scoring shots on the weekend, and only five against the Kangaroos last week (ranking them #1 overall – see chart below).

In contrast to the Roos though, the Bulldogs could barely get it forward in the first place, with Melbourne playing much of the game in their forward half. Their personnel in that half of the ground has always been strong, but this year so far it seems to be even a touch better. Karen Paxman, Elise O’Dea and returning captain Daisy Pearce have always been major ball winners, but improvement has come from Shelley Scott, who is averaging five more disposals per game, and Maddison Gay, who is averaging over five tackles.

And the Demons still have All-Australian ruckman Lauren Pearce to return. Demon and Docker fans might be starting to dream that their women’s teams could finally snag the premiership that has eluded their clubs for so long.

AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Round 1 2020

In the first week of the 2020 AFLW season: the ‘old’ teams establish a gap between them and the ‘new’ sides, the gap to the Crows closes, and some contenders come away with important wins.

Welcome to the AFLW…

Four teams had the joy of playing their first-ever match in the AFLW on the weekend, but three of them at least showed they may still have a ways to go to match it with the established sides.

In the opening match of the season, Richmond conceded the first five goals against Carlton before eventually going down by 34 points. The Blues played a large part of the game in possession of the ball in their forward half, having 74 (about 50 per cent) more disposals than the Tigers, over twice as many (27 to 12) clearances, and four times as many (44 to 11) inside 50s. If not for inaccuracy in front of goal, this could have been a huge win for Carlton. Perhaps some hope for Richmond lies in the fact that the Blues themselves suffered a big loss in their opening match last season, before fighting back all the way to the Grand Final.

West Coast went down by 27 points against Collingwood, with 47 less disposals than the Magpies. Meanwhile St. Kilda lost by 25 points to the Western Bulldogs, with 36 less disposals. In those two matches, the big differences were in the number of uncontested possessions and disposal efficiency, indicating that the more established teams are currently cleaner in their ball use. The other new side Gold Coast also had this issue, but the weather perhaps kept the Giants from taking full advantage. Only four players each for Richmond, West Coast, and Gold Coast recorded double figures for disposals, and most of them were those that had played AFLW before.

For all of the handwringing about the new teams ‘poaching’ players from the league’s foundation clubs, they may be a year or two away from providing stern competition yet.

The Crows lose first up, but some good signs are still there

So much for being a near certainty to win… the Adelaide Crows lost their very first match of the season to the Brisbane Lions, and were never even close to winning. I went through last week why the Crows probably were not as strong as the rankings thought, but it was still a substantial upset. Without injured co-captains Erin Phillips and Chelsea Randall, do the Crows look to be in trouble?

Yes and no. Adelaide had 33 more disposals than the Lions – including an astonishing 35 disposals from Anne Hatchard – and 12 more inside 50s. Those types of numbers should win a team more games than they lose. But of some concern is that the Crows did not convert well from inside 50, or defend well when Brisbane got the ball forward. Without their best goalkicker (Phillips) and best intercept defender (Randall), there is some reason to think that could continue to be a problem this year. Still, they should have enough to again be contending at year’s end. (And the rankings have them as ‘near certainties’ to win again next week.)

Early wins are important come season’s end

With only eight matches in the season, every win in AFLW is like gold, and the finals picture can change substantially from week to week. Unlucky in past seasons, Melbourne scored a crucial two-point win against the Kangaroos, on the back of two goals from Kate Hore. The Demons’ likely rivals Carlton and Fremantle also won, but this year there is room for all three teams to make the finals. On the other hand, Conference B looks to be shaping up as the stronger conference, with the Magpies and Bulldogs also winning.

Brisbane is now considered the likeliest third Conference A finalist behind Adelaide and the Kangaroos, replacing Richmond. As great as their first performance was though, it is questionable whether the young Lions can keep up that level of performance, potentially making the third Conference A position the spot where another new finalist can slip through.

AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Preview 2020

The AFL Women’s competition is back in 2020 for its fourth season, and so are my team rankings. In this preview post: ranking the four new teams, the effects of the uneven fixture, and which teams the rankings think are most likely to make the finals.

Ranking the new teams

The 2020 AFLW season will be the first for four teams: Gold Coast, Richmond, St. Kilda, and West Coast. Their entry has led to another bout of player movement between clubs, including former Bulldogs captain Katie Brennan becoming the first captain for the Tigers, and Dana Hooker moving from Fremantle to cross-town rivals West Coast. How do we rank these new entrants, and how does this affect the rankings of the ten existing teams?

Well, over the past few years everyone has had quite a bit of experience trying to figure out how new AFLW teams may go, including the original eight teams in the league’s inaugural season. My approach has been to use the bookmakers’ odds to set the initial rankings (though I’ve varied slightly each time in the exact way I’ve used them).

This approach has a few minor issues: the bookmakers’ odds may also take into account the difficulty of each team’s fixture – more on that below – which I haven’t tried to separate out. I also ended up excluding the Adelaide Crows from my regression, as last year they were such a massive outlier (more on that below as well).

Unsurprisingly three of the new teams are at long odds for the premiership, with Gold Coast’s odds being the longest. The exception is Richmond. This could in part be due to bullish Tiger bettors still basking in the glow of last season’s men’s premiership. Richmond has stacked its team with big-name forwards, and the AFLW has so far been a competition dominated more by midfielders. However, rival AFLW players also believe the Tigers to be the most likely new side to succeed, and a 30 point win against the Eagles in a practice match doesn’t hurt this view.

I’ve put the Tigers in among the group of teams underneath Adelaide, with Carlton, Fremantle, the Kangaroos, and Melbourne (see below). The other new teams I’ve put down with Collingwood, Geelong – one of the ‘luckiest’ finals sides there ever was, helped by the AFLW’s conference system – and the Brisbane Lions.

Note: Apart from changing the rankings to incorporate the new teams, I’ve also changed the Kangaroos’ home ground ‘disadvantage’ when playing away in Melbourne, and applied this retrospectively. With the Roos seeming more now like a part-Melbourne based team, I’ve done away with the disadvantage entirely, similar to Geelong in the men’s competition (although not the Cats’ women’s team).

Which club has the easiest fixture?

Many complaints are made about the unevenness of the AFL men’s fixture, but its effect pales against that of the fixture in the women’s league. Unlike the men’s league, AFLW has more teams than rounds. The league’s administration may have, in theory, made the conferences more even this year than last year. However, the addition of four new teams, taking the total up to fourteen, means that each club will not play five other teams at all.

As things sit now, the team that looks like it will benefit the most from this inequity in the fixture is the Fremantle Dockers (see table below). Of last year’s top teams the Dockers do not play Adelaide, the Kangaroos, and of course themselves. In addition, one of their ‘away’ games is against the Eagles in Perth.

Fremantle gains an estimated goal per game from the ease of their fixture, or one more expected win. In a season of eight rounds, that could come in handy when fighting for one of the six finals spots. Another finals aspirant Melbourne also avoids playing Adelaide, while Carlton and Richmond are among the eight teams that have to face the league’s powerhouse.

At the other end, St. Kilda gets a baptism of fire, playing every highly ranked side other than the Kangaroos. The Saints also receive only one ‘home’ game against a non-Victorian club, while they have to travel interstate twice. Of course, these fixture assessments could look very different once the finals actually approach.

ACL (Adelaide Crows ligaments) injuries even up the league

The 2019 AFLW premiers the Adelaide Crows may have been the most dominant team – men’s or women’s – in the history of the AFL. After tripping up in their opening match against the Bulldogs, the Crows got better and better, winning their matches by an average of 40 points, and their final three matches by an average of nearly ten goals.

In contrast, last year’s men premiers Richmond finished with a ranking of about five goals. The virtually all-conquering 2000 Essendon team won their matches by an average of over 50 points, but the average winning margin in the men’s league is around 30 to 40 points. In the AFLW last year it was just over 20 points, and that is with Adelaide’s thrashings propping it up.

Therefore, as we stand at the start of the season the Crows are estimated have close to a 100 per cent chance of winning each home and away match, and about a 90 per cent chance of winning all eight of them. The bookmakers don’t have Adelaide as being anywhere near that strong. What the bookmakers know that the rankings do not is that the Crows have lost both of their co-captains Chelsea Randall and Erin Phillips to ACL injuries – Randall for the whole season, and Phillips potentially so. Even aside from those injuries, one may expect Adelaide to regress a little. It is still a strong team however, led by All-Australians Ebony Marinoff and Anne Hatchard.

Player movement in the AFLW has made predictions from past performances fraught so far, but the rankings like six teams in particular to make this year’s finals. Adelaide, the Kangaroos, and Richmond (the Tigers based almost entirely on bookmakers’ odds) are considered the strongest teams in Conference A, while Fremantle, Carlton, and Melbourne are the favourites to emerge from Conference B. Gold Coast and St. Kilda are considered the most likely to be at the bottom of their respective conferences, with the Saints’ tough fixture hurting them.

I’ll be back each week with more AFLW rankings goodness, hopefully with statistics from the AFL website up and running again to support my number-crunching. In the meantime, here are the rankings’ predictions for the first round of matches. (Brisbane’s estimated probability of winning against Adelaide is actually 0.2 per cent, but for the reasons above, is likely somewhat underestimated.)