Thursday 26 October 2023

Rugby Union World Cup 2023 - A closer look at England after their sixth game

I know I've said a lot about England being inexplicable this World Cup, and wasn't that performance in the semifinal the most inexplicable of the lot. 

Who was expecting such a strong performance against South Africa?

Who had point-scoring moments for England?   Who-scored-for-England-after-6 Which once again highlights England's reliance on their kickers.

When do England score?   England-Point-Scoring-Moments-after-6 The pattern of not scoring as many in the first 20 minutes remains. 

England point-scoring moments by time and player: England-point-scoring-moments-by-time-and-player-after-6
The dendrogram continues to show that there was no continuity in England players who played together when they scored.Dendrogram-after-6
Which is also seen in the matrix diagram and the network diagramMatrix-after-6 Network-graph-after-6 The network diagram makes it particularly clear, because there's two separate lumps, with a couple of players linking them. 


If we look at point-concessions instead, England concede in minute 20-30 of each half.  When-England-concede-after-6 

I think Borthwick played Steward because he trusts him more than Smith defensively, which is supported by South Africa having fewer point-scoring moments than Fiji did. England-concessions-after-6 

I know there's a suggestion that Borthwick maybe should have changed to a more attacking formation 5 minutes earlier, but England wouldn't have been able to do that if they hadn't been building on a solid defence. 

While Elliot Daly is still the player present for the most point scoring moments for England: Point-scoring-moments-England-players-were-present-for-after-6 Itoje, Earl and Marchant were present for the most concessions. England-players-on-the-pitch-when-they-concede-after-6
The concession dendrogram looks like this:Concession-dendrogram-after-6 The concession matrix looks more like this:  Concession-matrix-after-6 And the 20 players in the network diagram for concessions give a good idea of who England's first 22 are. Concession-network-diagram-after-6 Since Borthwick has made it clear that he's going to use the 3rd place match to give players who've not had much game time a go, I think all the diagrams are going to get even more confused.

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