Ewen McKenzie has been encouraging the Wallabies to play more attacking rugby and the ultimate measure of a team’s success in attack is the number of tries scored.

In 2012 under Robbie Deans the Wallabies scored an average of one try per match and that trend continued in the Lions series with four tries in three matches.

Since McKenzie took over, the Wallabies have fared no better, scoring four tries in four matches.

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Are the Wallabies creating enough opportunities to score tries and then letting themselves down by not converting those opportunities due to basic handling errors or are handling errors limiting the number of opportunities created?

Alternatively is there another more important area that could lead to more tries being scored?

Handling errors

Trying to rate the impact of errors is very subjective and dependent on the interpretation of the person making the rating.

Accordingly, most statistics in rugby measure handling errors that lead to turnovers of possession rather than a less consistent rating of the impact of poor passes or dropped catches where possession was retained even though the attack may have been disrupted.

Just focussing on the number of errors a team makes can give you a false impression about a team’s performance in attack – playing one pass rugby with short passes close to the ruck or pick and drive may reduce the number of errors but is unlikely to improve your try scoring capability.

A team that makes lots of passes and offloads may make more errors but may also make more line breaks and score more tries.



The statistics show the Wallabies have lost possession 29 times as a result of handling errors in The Rugby Championship so far in 2013.

By comparison, the Springboks have recorded 37, the All Blacks 28 and the Pumas have been the best with only 22.

Those headline numbers suggests the Pumas have been significantly better with their handling than the other three teams and the Wallabies and All Blacks are sitting right on the average.

However, those numbers don’t provide the full picture and there are other factors we should consider in addition to the number of errors, such as the amount of possession each team has had and what they’ve tried to do with that possession.

Compared to the other three teams, the Wallabies have averaged 7% more phases in possession, 39% more passes in possession and 50% more offloads, so they have clearly been trying to attack more and that sort of game plan will likely lead to more errors.

In the graph below I’ve looked at turnovers from handling errors for each team in the Rugby Championship measured as:

1. The percentage of possessions (number of times a team gets the ball) turned over.

2. The number of phases the ball was retained per turnover.

3. The number of passes made per turnover.

4. The number of offloads made per turnover.



When you look at the number of handling errors that are leading to a turnover compared to the number of phases, passes and offloads for each team, the Wallabies’ handling skills have actually been better than the other three teams.

The statistics from the Wallabies’ match against the Pumas confirm that the type of game a team is playing will impact on their error rate.

In that match, the Wallabies only turned over possession six times as a result of handling errors.

That result was better than the nine turnovers in their previous match against the Springboks, but when you look deeper into the result by comparing the errors against the number of passes the Wallabies made in that match (11.33 passes per handling turnover), the performance was actually worse than the average for the previous three matches (19.63 passes per handling turnover).

That’s no real surprise given the conditions the match was played in but rather than a sudden improvement in handling skills the improvement in the number of handling errors in this match was a result of only 68 passes by the Wallabies compared to an average of 157 passes in each of their previous three matches.

The wet weather in that match led to a restricted game plan with less passing. If your focus was the number of handling turnovers a team makes you’d probably implement a similar game plan every match – kick the ball away in order to make less errors. No thanks!

Creating opportunities

Nearly every time a team has the ball there’s an opportunity created – an offload here or a step there could have led to a line break.



However measuring that type of opportunity is subjective, as it requires someone to make a decision as to whether it was really an opportunity or not.

As a result, most statistics measure opportunities created as when a line break occurs.

My line break statistics show the Wallabies have made 12 line breaks so far in The Rugby Championship, while they’ve conceded 22 line breaks.

However, even when just measuring line breaks there are differences between the various statistic providers.

Fox Sports show 10-20, Rugby Stats show 13-22, ESPN show 11-17 and SANZAR show 14-18.

The only significant difference in all those numbers is the number of line breaks conceded, as shown by ESPN and SANZAR, and that’s because they both record the Pumas as having made zero line breaks against the Wallabies.

Fox show three line breaks for the Pumas in that match as do Rugby Stats – I recorded four (24:30 by #14, 36:24 by #15, 62:53 by #7 and 63:35 by #13).

I don’t understand how anyone can come up with zero line breaks for the Pumas when you look at those instances.



This is another example that shows why making decisions or forming opinions just by relying on statistics, particularly if you don’t verify them, can give you a false impression.

Regardless of whose numbers you use, the Wallabies have averaged three line breaks per match so far in The Rugby Championship.

In 2010 and 2011 the Wallabies averaged seven line breaks per match but that fell to two per match in 2012 and was three per match during the Lions series.

By comparison, so far in The Rugby Championship both the All Blacks and Springboks have been averaging five line breaks per match and the Pumas two, so the Wallabies are not far behind the top two teams on that measure.

Converting opportunities into tries

Where the Wallabies do fall behind is in the conversion of possession and line breaks into tries.

As you can see in the graph below, the Wallabies average number of times in possession per try scored, the phases in possession per try scored and the number of line breaks they make per try scored is significantly behind the performance of both the All Blacks and Springboks.

The Wallabies are even behind the Pumas in these measures.



Obviously handling errors impact negatively on the Wallabies’ ability to convert opportunities and the more opportunities you can create the more likely you are to score tries, so there is room for improvement in both areas.

However, the main area of concern for the Wallabies is the number of times where the last pass fails to find a support runner after the hard work has been done to create a line break.

The biggest factor contributing to problems in this area is support runners getting themselves into poor positions, either being too far away, too close or running one way when they should have run the other way where more space existed.

If the support runner is not well positioned, the ball carrier is more likely to make a poor decision with their pass or offload to try and overcome the positioning issue.

It’s a key difference when you watch the All Blacks play – there always seems to be a support runner in position and with the ball carrier able to trust their support runners they’re less likely to make a poor decision with the final pass.

This isn’t something that’s appeared in the Wallabies’ game recently – it’s been a problem for some time as it is at all levels of the game.

It should be a real focus if teams want to improve conversion of opportunities into tries.



The Wallabies are still trying to come to terms with new attack systems, calls and game plans under McKenzie but they will have to start being more effective in finishing off opportunities quickly or this run of eight matches away from home is going to be even tougher than it should be.