Tuesday, 24 December 2024

Saints Ahoy! - Game 16 and the season to date (and an example of visualisation helps spot errors)

Saints beat London Broncos 52 - 6, with Percival converting 8/9 tries - https://www.saintsrlfc.com/matches/2024/first-team/london-broncos-v-saints-2024-06-16/ 

On the other hand, Makinson limped off within the first 10 minutes with a leg injury. As a team, we're not so good without him and he's part of the spine of our team.

Who scored for Saints in game 16?   Bar chart showing point-scoring moments for St. Helens players in the 16th game.  Percival is on top with 9 point-scoring moments (8 conversions and one try), followed by Clark with 3, then Blake with 2, and Mbye, Hurrell and Dodd with one each. Percival scored a try as well as the 8 conversions, hence his domination. 

It was the "who scored" chart that made me notice that 1) I'd missed Percival's conversion of his own try and then the "present when conceded in game 16" that made me notice I'd accidentally duplicated Bell after he'd gone off for Sam Royle and then come back on to replace Davies when he went off for his HIA (head injury assessment). 

I also learnt that Daryl Clark has earned his own song, which the Saints sing to "Dancing in the Dark". Given he is replacing one of the players generally regarded as one of our greatest ever (https://www.loverugbyleague.com/post/james-roby-stays-with-st-helens-as-retired-legend-details-his-new-wide-ranging-role), I think he's doing well. 

London Broncos did better the second time they played Saints in 2024 (https://fulltimesportsfan.wordpress.com/2024/02/21/saints-ahoy-rugby-league-data-visualisation-2024/), actually scoring this time, but in the last 2 minutes. Bar chart showing which teams scored against St Helens.  Hull KR have scored the most, but there are several teams that did not score any points and they are not on the chart. There is still no pattern to when Saints score up to the end of game 16. Bar chart - there is no pattern to where the peaks are.  It looks like a city skyline. There is a pattern to when they concede, although this time they avoided conceding in minutes 9-11. Bar chart of when Saints concede.  There is one obvious peak in minutes 9-11 made less obvious by minute 9 being at the end.  Still not found a way of stopping the visualisation doing that.  There is not a peak, but a concentration of point scoring moments, between minutes 71 and 80. 

So we concede either just after the first 10 or in the last 10 minutes. 

Who is present when Saints score? Who is present when Saints score.  Welsby is the most present for all 142.  He is a long way ahead of the next two, Blake and Hurrell.  Then there is a drop off to the next group around for 100-110 point-scoring moments, then another drop to players present for 90-95, then another cluster at around 80, then a long slow decline down to the players present for the least point-scoring moments, who Paasi, Ritson and Royle. Welsby is the only ever present, there for all 142 point scoring moments. Makinson missing this game, or all but the first 5 minutes, has dropped him into the middle of the pack. 

The "Who is present when Saints score" matrix looks like this. There is now a clear difference between the players in the pale area (Ritson, Royle, Paasi, Stephens, Davies, Knowles, Walmsley, Wingfield) who have been injured, and those in the darker areas, who nicely make a 17 players, the number of players on a match day squad.  They are Welsby, Hurrell, Blake, Whitley, Batchelor, Bennison, Dodd, Percival, Lomax, Bell, Clark, Sironen, Mbye, Matautia, Lees and Delaney. 

I like that the darker area does cover 17 players who would make a decent match day squad. They are Welsby, Hurrell, Blake, Whitley, Batchelor, Bennison, Dodd, Percival, Lomax, Bell, Clark, Sironen, Mbye, Mata'utia, Lees and Delaney. 

The network diagram looks like this: There are 17 players in the centre, they are Welsby, Hurrell, Blake, Whitley, Batchelor, Bennison, Dodd, Percival, Lomax, Bell, Clark, Sironen, Mbye, Matautia, Lees and Delaney.  Only 4 of the less frequently together players make the network diagram, they are Stephens, sticking out on the right, Davies, sticking out of the bottom, Wingfield, bottom left, and Walmsley, top right. 

It pleases me that the 17 players are also those in the centre of the network diagram. Not sure why only 4 of the less frequently present players are in the diagram (Stephens, Davies, Wingfield and Walmsley) but they are the most frequently present of the infrequents so I presume it's that. 

How about players present when Saints concede? There is a much steeper drop off in this diagram than the equivalent scoring one.  Welsby is still on top, he really has been there all the time.  Paasi, only back for a couple of matches, and used sparingly in them, is present for the least. Welsby is top of this one too, because he really is ever present. The players that follow him are in a different order. I suspect that either concede or scored will hit another big number shortly so the orders can be compared. 

The steeper drop off in the "concession moments present for" diagram is also reflected in the matrix diagram. In this diagram, the pale, less-often-present-together area includes Paasi, Davies, Royle, Wingfield, Walmsley, Ritson, Lees and Mbye.  The darker area includes Welsby, Dodd, Matautia, Blake, Hurrell, Lomax, Delaney, Makinson, Clark, Bell, Bennison, Sironen, Whitley, Percival, Batchelor and Knowles. There are only 16 players in the darkest area. They are Welsby, Dodd, Mata'utia, Blake, Hurrell, Lomax, Delaney, Makinson, Clark, Bell, Bennison, Sironen, Whitley, Percival, Batchelor and Knowles. I think Lees misses out because he was off the pitch because of yellow cards for several point-concessions. 

The network graph is less tightly packed. This network graph has six players in the centre, Matautia, Blake, Dodd, Hurrell, Clark, Welsby, then 12 players around them in a sort of shield shape.  Sticking out are Ritson, at the top, Wingfield, bottom right, Walmsley, bottom left. 

It's those 16 again, because they are closely related, and this time it's Ritson, Wingfield and Walmsley that are present from the pale group.

No comments:

Post a Comment