AFL WOMEN'S Rankings: Round 4 SEASON 7

The Lions rule

In the battle of (arguably) the two strongest teams in the AFL Women’s competition, the Brisbane Lions triumphed over Melbourne/ Naarm by 15 points, coming back from a three-goal deficit in the first quarter. As expected, Brisbane did not dominate the scoreboard or the main statistics to the extent they have in their first three matches of this season. After the first ten minutes though they were able to effectively ‘put the clamps’ on the Demons, recording six more inside 50s, 11 more contested possessions, and perhaps crucially 18 to six tackles inside their 50 metre arc.

The Demons are a fairly deep team, but the Lions may be even deeper. For all of their experience, Melbourne still have some relative ‘newbies’ filling out their team (i.e. started in the past two years) including West, Mackin, Chaplin, Gillard, Fitzsimon, and debutant Campbell. Aside from the precociously talented Farquharson and Pullar, Brisbane didn’t have anyone that was not at least in their fourth season. They may not have much in terms of ‘superstars’ outside of reigning AFLW best and fairest Emily Bates, but their level of depth (Anderson, O’Dwyer, Davidson, Svarc, Conway, Dawes, Wardlaw, Hodder, etc.) is going to be hard to stop.

The Crows show they are still a force

Last week’s post focused on how this season’s Adelaide Crows were a step below their premiership-winning teams of the past several years, but the Crows were quite impressive – though inaccurate – in their win against a solid Collingwood side on the weekend. Adelaide dominated territory, with 36 to 15 inside 50s, but also got their ‘outside’ game going with 23 more uncontested possessions than the Pies.

The Magpies have been impressive this season, however the absence of Brianna Davey and Brittany Bonnici was probably more evident against a midfield that boasts Ebony Marinoff and Anne Hatchard. Marinoff and Hatchard are not just impressive ‘in the coalface’; they can get the ball around the ground too, with Hatchard ranking second in the league for disposals this season despite not always starting in the centre

The Crows’ experience profile is more like the Demons than the Lions, and their match against the Magpies seems like it was more ‘the bronze medal match-up’ compared with the ‘championship bout’ between Brisbane and Melbourne / Naarm. Still the Crows look to have stamped themselves as at least the third best team, or at least one of the top five teams alongside the Lions, Demons, Magpies, and the Western Bulldogs, this season.

AFL WOMEN'S Rankings: Round 3 SEASON 7

Three-time AFL Women’s premiers the Adelaide Crows were expected to have some difficulty sustaining their success once the other AFL team from South Australia – Port Adelaide – entered the women’s league. This was mainly due to losing two-time league best and fairest Erin Phillips to be the Power’s inaugural captain, although they otherwise did reasonably well in holding on to their premiership players.

The Crows’ start to the season though has been somewhat below what might have been expected. They have so far lost to last season’s runners-up Melbourne at home by three goals, beat Richmond – but only by nine points, and beat North Melbourne at home by 14 points. This sees them sit just inside the top eight at this point.

They were also well beaten by the Demons and Tigers in particular areas (see table above). Melbourne amassed an astonishing 73 more uncontested possessions than Adelaide in their match, which is an area (one of the many) that the Crows have dominated in the past. Then Adelaide were well beaten in the territory battle by Richmond, having 18 less inside 50s, but managed to get over the line through some late goals. They were a bit more convincing against North Melbourne – although the score was close until the fourth quarter, the final score was probably a fair reflection of the difference between the two sides.

The Crows are still one of the better teams though. They have another tough match this week against Collingwood, but it may be when their fixture becomes easier they can deal out some convincing wins again. For now Brisbane looks to be the new power side, but there would still be some uneasiness for any team that has to face the Crows this season.

AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Round 2 SEASON 7

The Dockers plummet

Last season Fremantle made the AFL Women’s preliminary finals. This weekend they scored a solitary point at home against Geelong. That followed a 49-point loss to Brisbane in their first match of the season.

The Dockers have been inside 50 only 37 times in their two matches, which is less than half the number of their two opponents. They’ve had 53 less contested possessions, and 86 less uncontested possessions, putting them at or near the bottom of the league for differentials for both measures. Their tackles have dropped by three per game, while the league average has increased by six per game. It has been a dramatic fall so far.

In the previous season Fremantle had one of the best midfields going around, and a formidable forward line. Kiara Bowers, Hayley Miller, and Gabby O’Sullivan were all in the top 25 for average contested possessions per game. Ebony Antonio and Gemma Houghton were in the top 20 for average goals per game, and Kara Antonio and Miller were in the top 10 for average score involvements.

This season the Antonios have been lost to injury, Houghton lost to expansion team Port Adelaide, and O’Sullivan has been shifted back into the forward line. O’Sullivan’s possessions have gone down significantly, but Freo’s other mids Dana East and Aine Tighe haven’t stepped up their ball-winning to compensate. Even Bowers and Miller have been somewhat down on last season’s form.

Replicating last season’s preliminary final berth looks out of reach now, but there should still be enough talent at the Dockers to fare better this season than they have so far. This week’s match against the Bulldogs should give us more of an indication whether this is just a temporary dip in form, or a sign of something more permanent.

Geelong on top, but Brisbane are probably the best

Through holding the Dockers to one point, Geelong is actually on top of the AFLW ladder after Round 2, having allowed only twelve points in their two games so far. However they haven’t been as dominant in general play, having scored only 42 points themselves, and actually turning the ball over more than their opponents.

Instead the dominant team at the moment is probably Brisbane. The Lions have scored almost 100 more points than their opponents across their two matches, and they’ve had over double the number of inside 50s, and over 40 more contested possessions and uncontested possessions.

The Lions’ main challengers appear to be Melbourne, who would be currently ranked more similarly to Brisbane if they had been more accurate in front of goal against North Melbourne on the weekend. Melbourne has kept possession of the ball better than anyone, averaging 60 more uncontested possessions than their opponents. Their fixture has been tougher than Brisbane’s so far – having played North and last year’s premiers Adelaide – so we should get a better idea of how dominant they are playing against (an admittedly improved) St. Kilda this weekend.

AFL WOMEN’S Rankings: Round 1 SEASON 7

Essendon look to be the pick of the new teams

There are two massive changes to the AFL Women’s competition for this season. The first is that the competition has moved to winter, with “Season 7” kicking off just a few months after the previous one ended. The second is that the four remaining AFL clubs without a women’s team – Essendon, Hawthorn, Port Adelaide, and Sydney – have now joined the league, meaning that the league’s expansion is (for now) complete.

In general it has been tricky to rate these new teams coming in, although most have struggled against the more established sides (North Melbourne being the main exception). For ranking purposes I’ve tended to use the bookmaker’s odds to assign each new team an initial ranking, with the view that these should soon adapt if the strength of the new teams turns out to be significantly different to prior expectations.

Pre-season expectations however are looking to be fairly on base with regard to one team so far, namely Essendon who have built themselves a pretty handy side. They were the only new side to win on the weekend, and while that win came against another new team in Hawthorn, it was still an impressive display by the Bombers as they had 17 scoring shots and a +16 contested possession differential.

Essendon’s playing list has a good mix of both experienced AFLW and VFLW players, and quality rookies. 2020 AFLW best and fairest winner Madison Prespakis leads the midfield, while former All-Australian Jess Wuetschner and 2022 All-Australian squad member Bonnie Toogood give them reliable targets up forward. The Bombers also have some promising draft picks and players from their undefeated 2022 VFLW premiership side such as Paige Scott, Alana Barba, Danielle Marshall, and Amelia Radford.

Essendon will certainly have some tougher tests later in the season than they did on the weekend, but it was a polished performance by the Bombers in their first match.

An early trend?

One suggestion coming into this AFL Women’s season about how the switch to a winter season might change the style of play was that there may be more tackles and contests, due to the wetter and colder weather.

While it was not particularly wet on the weekend, we did see a shift to a more contested style of play, or perhaps more accurately a shift away from an uncontested one. Many teams recorded more contested than uncontested possessions in the first round, with an average ratio of 1.03 compared with 0.88 last season (see table below). However this was primarily due to a drop in the number of uncontested possessions, with contested possessions staying at similar levels. Though we might expect some of the new teams to go through some growing pains before being able to create clean chains of uncontested possessions, well-established sides such as Fremantle and Adelaide also struggled to link up. 

Was it an anomaly, some rust, or early signs of a trend for the winter months? We will know more in the weeks ahead.

AFL Rankings: Round 23 2022

Going into the 2023 AFL Finals Series, there are three teams that collectively it looks likely the premiership winner will come from.

Geelong is the favourite, finishing on top of the ladder with 18 wins out of 22 matches, including their past 13. Reigning premiers Melbourne are the second favourite, with some up-and-down form over the second half of the season, but finished up by a dominating with in Brisbane. Sydney is the outsider of the three, particularly as they will have to play at least two matches in Victoria to win, however they have stepped up above the pack to move closer to the top two teams over recent weeks. All three teams are up or near the top in winning the ball and gaining territory (see table below).

As for the other finalists – I’m picking that Fremantle’s and Brisbane’s home ground advantage gets them over the line in the first week, but they go out the next week when on the road. That makes Collingwood my other predicted preliminary finalist… but surely their luck/ability to win close matches they are well behind in comes to an end at some point. Melbourne would probably be a bit nervous about the Pies given their two losses to them this season, but I think it’s unlikely Collingwood gets past Geelong or Sydney.

Prediction from me then: Geelong v Melbourne in the Grand Final, with the Cats winning their first premiership since 2011. Though it feels like this is far from the first time recently I’ve predicted a Geelong flag after an impressive home-and-away season…

AFL Rankings: Round 22 2022

 

It has been a tumultuous week so far at Essendon, following their 84-point loss on the weekend. A great deal of uncertainty reportedly exists as to who will be coaching them or in the football department next season. One football show I watched last night started with a montage of Essendon’s worst performances during the season, creating an image of a team that has just about hit rock bottom.

It hasn’t been quite as bad as that for the Bombers this season, but probably somewhat disappointing after their strong end to the 2021 home-and-away season. Putting aside expectations, certainly they have not been as poorly performed as West Coast or North Melbourne this year (see table below). From Rounds 16 to 18 they had an impressive stretch of form, beating Sydney and Brisbane – who will both play finals this year – and easily beating Gold Coast.

On the other hand, there are half a dozen ‘poor’ losses that stand out for Essendon across the season (see table above). These are: their 66-point loss in the opening round to Geelong, their 48-point loss to Fremantle in Victoria, their 58-point loss to Sydney (where Swan Luke Parker mocked their willingness to contest), their loss to the Eagles, and their recent losses to GWS and Port Adelaide. That they were favourite or close to favourite in four of those matches haven’t helped perceptions about their effort.

Ultimately, the Bombers have dropped off compared with last season, but their fall is possibly a little overblown. Their differentials in most major categories are negative but not horrendous. Their ‘double up’ fixtures of Brisbane, Sydney, Collingwood, Richmond, and Port Adelaide has not been the easiest of runs, and if not for an after-the-siren loss they would have come out of those fixtures relatively OK. Prolonged absences from two of their stars of last season – Darcy Parish and Jake Stringer – have hurt.

Not much of which will be comfort to a club and supporter base that has not won a final in 18 years. But even though this season has definitely been a step back, it has not all been the catastrophe it has seemed over the past fortnight.

AFL Rankings: Round 21 2022

 

During the first half of this season the Fremantle Dockers were widely considered to be one of the big improvers, and perhaps a contender for the premiership, particularly after they beat both Geelong and Melbourne in Victoria. They won 10 of their first 13 matches, and then have dropped off a bit by winning only three of their seven matches (with one draw) since. Where do they sit now?

The rankings currently have them as sixth, which is probably around where most people see them. The rankings pretty much agree with the ‘win-loss’ column here; the Dockers were considered to be significantly better over their first 13 matches with an average adjusted net margin of 16 points, compared to their past seven matches with an average adjusted net margin of -2 points. Their ranking has still improved in recent weeks however as last year’s performances have gradually been removed.

Earlier in the season, the Dockers basically improved all over the ground, though particularly in defence. Their points per inside 50 and inside 50 differential improved significantly from 2021, and their opposition points per inside 50 decreased to be one of the best in the league (see below).

Part of this could be attributed to their greater reliance on ‘chipping’ the ball around to get it out of defence and advance it forward. The Dockers lead the league in uncontested possessions. Seven Dockers – ‘inside’ midfielders Andrew Brayshaw, Will Brodie, and Caleb Serong, ‘outside’ midfielders Blake Acres and James Aish, and defenders Jordan Clark and Hayden Young – are in the top 60 for average uncontested possessions per match this season. Indeed one could say the distinction between ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ midfielders is not that clear with Brayshaw getting plenty of possession on the ‘wings’ this season.

This weight of uncontested possession has kept up over the past seven matches (see table above), as has the efficiency within the 50 metre arcs. What has fallen in actually the Dockers’ ability to get the ball inside 50 relative to the opposition, with Carlton, Sydney, and Melbourne all winning the inside 50 count by big margins when they played them. To some degree this may be teams working out how to counter the Dockers’ uncontested game style once they get into the middle of the ground. While Carlton smashed Freo in the clearances, Sydney and Melbourne were around level with the Dockers in that area, suggesting it was in the ‘uncontested’ part of the game where they were able to counter.

This gives an overall sense of a team that was able to get the ‘jump’ on others earlier in the season, but which the top teams have now been able to ‘work out’. Still Fremantle remain near the top of the ladder. For a team that has missed the finals for several years this season is still a major improvement, and they are now set to get some valuable finals experience in a month’s time.

AFL Rankings: Round 20 2022

 

The GWS Giants have largely been seen a massive disappointment this season, only sitting above the historically poor Eagles and Roos on the ladder, with five wins. Long-time coach Leon Cameron resigned during the season, and interim coach Mark McVeigh questioned on the weekend whether a large part of the team had ‘checked out’. Further (and perhaps not unrelated) there is speculation that young midfielders Jacob Hopper and Tim Taranto could be on the move at the end of the season, as GWS tries to re-balance its playing list.

Not much of this was widely expected from a team that made the finals last season, and are only three years removed from their Grand Final appearance. The Giants – rightly or wrongly – are still perceived to have one of the most talented midfields in the competition, with Hopper and Taranto, along with Josh Kelly, Stephen Coniglio, Lachie Whitfield, Callan Ward, and Tom Green. How can a list so talented be so far down the ladder?

There are probably two main misconceptions about the Giants. The first misconception is that they are stacked with talent: in the past five years they have lost Jeremy Cameron, Dylan Shiel, Zac Williams, Devon Smith, Jeremy Finlayson, Matthew Kennedy, Nathan Wilson, Aidan Corr, and Rory Lobb to other teams when they have still had a good few years of football in them. That weight of departures has to weaken your team at some point.

The second misconception is that they have been one of the best teams of the past few years. The Giants’ peak year was their preliminary final appearance in 2016. That is when the perception of the Giants as a top class midfield solidified in fans’ minds, as they easily outpaced opponents for clearances, contested possessions, inside 50s, and disposals per match (see table below). Their defence was also pretty good in that year. Since then they have gradually lost their advantage in all of these areas. Even their Grand Final season of 2019 seemed better than it was thanks to a couple of (memorable) close finals wins; they were actually behind on inside 50 differential that season. Now in 2022 they are behind in all of the aforementioned categories.

Of their playing group, many have either left or declined from that Grand Final season. Kelly and Coniglio are still stars, although given the amount of salary cap space their contracts take they probably need to be closer to the league’s best midfield combinations such as Melbourne’s Clayton Oliver and Christian Petracca. Green, Sam Taylor, Harry Perryman, Isaac Cumming, and Harry Himmelberg have also emerged as solid players. Whitfield and Hopper have had injury-interrupted seasons however, while few would argue that Ward, Phil Davis, Nick Haynes, or even Toby Greene are as strong as they were a few years back. The Giants (somewhat understandably) have found it hard to replace Jeremy Cameron – particularly with Finlayson also departing – but Williams was probably an underrated loss given his disposal efficiency bringing the ball out of defence, and Heath Shaw was also solid down back during the Giants’ strongest years.

And now the Giants face losing even more players. They seem to be heading down a path of having some high-priced stars (Kelly, Coniglio, and Whitfield), squeezing out the next tier (Hopper and Taranto), and then hoping for similar production from lower-priced players and rookies. Given that half a dozen inside midfield players cannot all attend the same centre bounce – a problem that plagued Leon Cameron’s tenure – this may not be a bad path to take. But it might be at least a couple of years yet before we see the Giants back challenging for a flag.