Only three games of AFL footy faces us before the end of the calendar year, which leave us at HPN in a state of pre-withdrawal.

As it happens, both preliminary finals offer two studies in contrasts. Tonight we’ll see two very different midfield systems go toe to toe, and tomorrow we’ll see probably the most territorially dominant side go up against the team best equipped to punish opponents with limited forward line opportunities. Let’s look at each in turn.

Richmond v Collingwood

The Tigers play turnover footy, plain and simple. As we wrote about for ABC Grandstand, they lose stoppages badly because they play a looser and more open game around the ball, their game instead built around baiting and then punishing risky offensive play with intercepting defenders.

(Regular season data)

In the first week of the finals the Tigers played to type in losing the stoppage battle but winning the clearance war. Perhaps more importantly the Tigers won the inside 50 battle 66 to 36 – simply denying the Hawks the opportunity to score.

Collingwood, with strength in the ruck contest and in clearances, need to come to grips with the turnover game and not play into Richmond’s hands with unwise overly fast movement. Through Grundy and their core mids they can win more of ball from neutral situations, but the key test will be in not just over-committing to the contest then handing it over in open play so that Richmond can whisk it the other way.

In the finals so far the Pies have managed to balance things reasonably well, breaking even in clearances (while winning the turnover battle) against GWS, but they were a bit loose against West Coast with respect to turnovers.

Last time they played

The Round 19 clash saw Collingwood match it the Tigers for exactly three quarters, before a 5 minute burst at the start of the fourth put the game to rest, and Richmond ran out 28 point winners.

Collingwood’s midfield did the job around the ball that day. They won clearances 45-34 including 32-20 stoppage clearances. They doubled the Tigers in hitouts, 50-25. The fact that they laid 72 tackles to 48 suggests their pressure and physicality was good enough. The problem was outside of the contest, where Richmond had the edge as they typically have all year:

Collingwood gave up 12 more turnovers 90-78 and that 168 turnovers for the game is well above the league average of 143, and also above either team’s individual average (Richmond 155 and Collingwood 149 per game). It was the result of two teams whose games both typically turn a bit helter skelter, with plenty of high risk, turnover-heavy play. They’re two teams who have both been comfortable playing in those sorts of situations.

The problem for the Pies is, although the they’ve done well with high turnover footy this year, they’re not in Richmond’s league on that front. The Qualifying Final against West Coast was a very high paced encounter which they struggled with at the end. While the slower pace of the Semi Final against GWS, with 59 less possessions, 10 less turnovers than the previous week, saw them pull away in the crunch.

The Pies with their speedy, defence-stretching set of non-key forwards are good on a fast break counterattack, but they are nothing like the Tigers’ level in raw intercept defence. If they dominate the stoppage and clearance game but just hand the ball back, they can’t win. Collingwood probably need to look to slow things down more than they’ve been comfortable doing this year, and carefully pick their moments to accelerate.

West Coast v Melbourne

This is a clash between two teams who are so disproportionately strong in one part of the ground that it’s really a contest of which strength wins out. Simply put, the Eagles need to get enough ball froward to exploit their league-best forward line, while Melbourne’s midfield has been the best all year in dominating inside 50 territory:

The critical thing to note with the data above is that the Eagles have managed to have the most efficient forward line in the league with Kennedy missing for half the year. The Dees have scored similarly efficiently to that hobbled Eagles level, but as we noted a fortnight ago, Kennedy and Darling together take the Eagles to another tier in terms of scoring power:

With Gawn sure to dictate terms out of the centre, and with some of the best ground ball winners and clearance generating players in the competition around him, they’ll aim protect their defenders through simple territory. If Melbourne play to their strengths, the replacement of Fritsch by Smith should barely even matter, because the Eagles wouldn’t get enough looks at the footy to be decisive.

Last time they played

In round 22, Melbourne beat West Coast by 17 in Perth. The most notable difference is Kennedy was missing and Darling only played 9% of the match. On the other side, the Dees were missing Viney and instead fielding Kent, and this week they’ve gone with Joel Smith over Bailey Fritsch as a tactical move.

Melbourne won the inside-50 count 55-47 that day, and both sides were about as efficient in scoring per inside 50 as each other. If this sort of gap occurs again, the Eagles need to make up about 0.3 points per inside 50. That’s pretty realistic an objective – this year they’ve been about 0.44 points per inside 50 better with both Kennedy and Darling with one or both missing:

It stands to reason that Kennedy and Darling are very capable of scoring more than three goals but some of their goals would be opportunities that other forwards would have taken in their absence anyway. The “points per inside 50” approach tends to suggest that the inclusion Kennedy and Darling make this game look very close, rather than pushing the Eagles into strong favouritism.

We also must consider that a bit more oompf via the inclusion of Viney could well increase Melbourne’s midfield edge. And perhaps the Joel Smith inclusion will prove the master stroke that curbs the Eagles just enough to keep Melbourne ahead of them. At the end of the day, though, it’s very much a contest of Melbourne’s midfield’s ability to provide a territorial edge versus the potentially unstoppable scoring power of the Eagles forward line.

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