Read on Twitter
In @Murray_Kinsella’s recent interview with Joe Schmidt, the coach made an interesting comment about the respective offloading abilities of Irish players and New Zealanders:
“Schmidt does...suggest that offloading comes more naturally to Kiwi players than Irish players.
“‘Because they play off quick ball and because they start in rugby so young, it is a bit more intuitive in their players than it is in ours,’ said Schmidt.”
“‘Because they play off quick ball and because they start in rugby so young, it is a bit more intuitive in their players than it is in ours,’ said Schmidt.”
How could we go about assessing this?
NZ Super Rugby sides typically post higher offload rates (total offloads/total carries) than the Irish provinces do in domestic action - but rates of offloading are higher in SR on the whole, so this may be due to better European defences.
NZ Super Rugby sides typically post higher offload rates (total offloads/total carries) than the Irish provinces do in domestic action - but rates of offloading are higher in SR on the whole, so this may be due to better European defences.
However, Kiwis playing in European competition alongside Irish players provides a fairer test: if Schmidt’s assertion were true, we would expect to see NZ players post higher offload rates than their Irish counterparts against the same defences.
We can work through this with data from the first two rounds of this season’s Champions Cup.
The average offload rate across the competition’s first 20 games of 2019-20 was 5.8% (i.e. if the average team carries 100 times, you would expect to see about 6 successful offloads).
The average offload rate across the competition’s first 20 games of 2019-20 was 5.8% (i.e. if the average team carries 100 times, you would expect to see about 6 successful offloads).
Irish players have offloaded successfully on 5.8% of their carries so far, in line with the competition average.
(All four provinces have posted team offload rates between 4%-6%.)
(All four provinces have posted team offload rates between 4%-6%.)
The NZ players who have played in this year’s ERCC have an average offload rate of 7.3%.
(These players are scattered across a wide range of teams and positions, thus minimising the potential effects of player role and team tactics on this rate.)
(These players are scattered across a wide range of teams and positions, thus minimising the potential effects of player role and team tactics on this rate.)
In other words, a carry by a Kiwi in this season’s Champions Cup has been about 1.3x more likely than average to result in an offload.
With some simple analysis of @espnscrum data, we can therefore conclude that Schmidt’s intuition has some basis in fact.
With some simple analysis of @espnscrum data, we can therefore conclude that Schmidt’s intuition has some basis in fact.
(Given Schmidt’s point that this is something that starts at a young age, included in NZ players are those who grew up there but now represent other nations - e.g. Bundee Aki - and excluded from Irish players are those IQ players who grew up elsewhere - e.g. Mike Haley.)
