Tuesday, 14 January 2025

Saints Ahoy! - Game 18 and the season to date

No diagrams for the game itself because it finished 6-8 to Castleford so the diagrams contain very little information. A match report can be found here - https://www.saintsrlfc.com/2024/07/05/saints-suffer-narrow-loss-to-the-tigers/  It appears to have been a bit of an arm wrestle. 

L will tell you that I tend towards the melodramatic when Saints lose to Castleford. I blow it out of all proportion. This is not because Castleford are not a good team. It's more that losing to them is almost always a sign of a Saints season that will not end well. (Seriously tempted to do a stats test on that to prove it's not just fan-madness) 

Good things to take from this match: Two new players got blooded in. The new players (and semi-new players) do give me hope for the future. Sam Royle, first ever try for Saints - yay! 

Things I am going to use to try to feel better: It was all going so well until minute 50. It can go better again. 

On to the season so far: 

There is still no pattern to when Saints score. Bar chart of when Saints score. There is no pattern. 

The pattern that was forming for when Saints conceded seems to have broken. Bar chart of when Saints concede. There is a peak between 9-12 minutes and a larger but flatter plateau after 70 minutes, but they do not stand out as much as they used to. 
Who scores for Saints? Bar chart. Percival, the kicker, dominates even more. There are now 19 players who have scored for Saints in 2024. 
Who scores against Saints? Bar chart of who scores against Saints. Not all the matches are present because Saints have held two teams to nil. Saints have had 149 point-scoring moments and conceded 67, so the update on who is unexpectedly high on either "present when scoring" or "present when conceding" charts will have to wait until the next game. 

Jack Welsby is still the only ever present on both charts. First, who is present when Saints score? Bar chart. Jack Welsby is at the top, present for all 149 of the point-scoring moments for Saints. He is followed by Blake and Hurrell. At the bottom are Paasi, Ritson and Royle. Two of them have been injured and the refusal of Wellens to play Ritson remains inexplicable. 
Who is present when Saints concede? Bar chart. Jack Welsby is at the top, present for all 67 of the point-conceding moments for Saints. He is followed by Dodd and Blake. At the bottom are Paasi, Vaughan and Burns. Vaughan and Burns were the two Saints debutants in this match. 
What has game 18 done to the matrix and network graphs? 

Interesting things. 

The 'who are present together when Saints score' matrix now looks like this:Matrix graph of who is present together when Saints score. The bottom right hand quarter is taken up with the darkest area, those players who are together most often. The remaining half of the diagram, working upwards or leftwards, is now in thirds, which is unexpected. The three clusters in the paler part are (working from darkest of the pale to palest of the pale) Whitley, Batchelor and Bennison, then Davies, Walmsley, Knowles and Wingfield, then the palest section of Royle, Paasi, Ritson and Stephens. 

The darkest 14 aren't really what interests me. It's the fact that the paler half is now split into three thirds, with the Whitley, Batchelor and Bennison cluster, then the Davies, Walmsley, Knowles and Wingfield cluster (or the 'oh, how many of our props have been injured?!!!' cluster), then the palest section of Royle, Paasi, Ritson and Stephens. 

The network graph looks spectacularly odd: Network graph. There is a central blob. Knowles and Wingfield are on the edges of the blob. Sticking out from the blob, anticlockwise from centre right, are Stephens, Paasi, Royle, Davies (although he is closer to the central blob) and Walmsley. There are lines joining Paasi, Royle, Davies, Walmsley, Knowles and Wingfield, indicating that when they are present when Saints score, they are present with each other. 

It's the cross points between the arms that are sticking out of the central blob that I don't understand. I presume it means that while Paasi, Royle, Davies, Walmsley, Knowles and Wingfield aren't often with the others when Saints score, when they are present, they are often with each other, with Wingfield and Knowles being closer to the central blob indicating that they are present for more of Saints's scoring moments. 

The "who is present when Saints concede" matrix is also interesting, divided as it is almost in four along each edge. Network matrix of which players are together most frequently when Saints concede. The edges are each divided into almost quarters. The darkest quarter (the players who are together most frequently when Saints concede) is at the right most and bottom of the two axes. Next (moving left or up) is a paler area, then another area only slightly paler but different enough to be visible, then a big change in paleness to the palest quarter (leftermost or top). 

The equivalent network graph looks more like you would expect. Network graph. There is a central core and 4 players sticking out, Davies at the top, Ritson to the right, Walmsley off the bottom and Wingfield sort of southwesterly. Unlike the present when Saints score equivalent, there are no lines between the players who stick out. 

I can at least explain why Walmsley, Wingfield and Davies are sticking out, they have been injured. But Ritson is inexplicable. Or rather, I know it's because he's not been playing, it's the why of that that I don't understand.
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