Whilst we were the most inexperienced team to take the field in Round 14 and we are rebuilding for the next decade and sorting out which players will be delisted/traded at year's end,our team stats look interesting and somewhat suprising.

Here are our team stats so far for 2008

Hitouts---------------3rd

Clearances----------15th

Contested Poss. ----15th

Contested Mark-----15th

Uncontested Poss.---7th

Inside 50-------------16th

Scores for------------15th

Rebound 50----------3rd

1% ers---------------5th

The surprising stat is our Ruck division is 3rd in the comp this year but our mids can't take advantage.I thought we would have fared better in Contested poss as we look at bit harder at the ball this year,only Saints are worse which isn't surprising a la Dal Santo (you get the ball and handball it to me).Our biggest problem is our midfield which is why we are ranked 16th for inside 50's,if our midfield can't win the ball,we can't take it inside 50 and it wouldn't matter if we had Buddy Franklin & Jonathan Brown,the ball isn't going inside 50 enough to kick a big enough score.Not winning the clearances also puts huge pressure on our backline which is ranked 16th understandably.

It's a chain reaction-We are ranked 15th for scores for BECAUSE we are ranked 16th for inside 50's BECAUSE we are ranked 15th for clearances which isn't good enough because we are ranked 3rd in hitouts.

Which begs the question,should we target:

Naitanui-Ruck/Mid

Rich-Mid

Watts-Forward

We desperately need another topline mid but if we take Rich,we will have to go with our current forwardline for the next 5-7 years because we'll have no chance to get a gun forward with the Gold Coast raping the next few drafts.That's why i'm leaning towards Watts and hoping we can build a forwardline around him for the next 10 years.We pick up Warnock with 2nd round pick,Prismall in PSD and Priority pick is still free.

Watts-new forward

Warnock-new Ruckman

Prismall-new midfielder

Pick 17- ??????????

I'd be pretty damn happy with that!!!!!!!!!

Some comparisons (I know they are a class above and a lot more experienced, but it is interesting reading)

Disposals

Cats (397) #1

Melb (348) #10

Long Kicks

Cats (72) #5

Melb (56) #16

Cont. Marks

Cats (8.7) #4

Melb (6.3) #15

Handballs

Cats (189) #1

Melb (155) #7

Tackles

Cats (66.4) #8

Melb (67.1) #7

Clearances

Cats (32.5) #6

Melb (29.5) #15

Inside 50

Cats (59) #1

Melb (42) #16

Cont. Poss.

Cats (45) #1

Melb (34) #15

1%'ers

Cats (88) #1

Melb (84) #5

* Contested possessions are a far more important stat than clearances!

* This leads to more disposals due to more possession time

* We are ahead in tackles due to the fact that we are quite often 2nd to the ball/chasing tail

Just goes to show what a solid, experienced and tenacious side can achieve without totally dominating the clearances!

Hit the gym dees..... You boys are young and fit and should have no problems ending up looking like the ripped cats!

Here's some equations that you can glean from the stats:

Long Kicks (16) = Contested Marks (15) = Inside 50 (16)

Disposals (10) - Inside 50 (16) = Overuse of the football

Just goes to demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief on this forum, it's not a sin to kick the ball long.

Tackles

Cats (66.4) #8

Melb (67.1) #7

* We are ahead in tackles due to the fact that we are quite often 2nd to the ball/chasing tail

Geelong are low in tackles because there usually the ones with ball!!!

Another intersting stat i found (yes i have too much time on my hands tonight) is Port Adelaide.

Port are ranked 1st in hitouts,2nd in clearances but 13th for cont. poss. and 14th for inside 50!!!

They have the best hitout/clearance comination in the AFL (Lade,Brogan,Burgoyne x 2,Pierce,Rodan,Salopek, K.Cornes) but they're not hard enough around the packs and don't win near enough cont poss around the ground which strongly affects their inside 50's.

Does anyone know if Salopek wants to come home yet? I'd trade Rivers and Bell(both croweaters) for him,he's a gun!!! we could snag him in the PSD.

Here's some equations that you can glean from the stats:

Long Kicks (16) = Contested Marks (15) = Inside 50 (16)

Disposals (10) - Inside 50 (16) = Overuse of the football

Just goes to demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief on this forum, it's not a sin to kick the ball long.

To break it down further, overuse of the ball out of the back line/midfield followed by turn over = 16th for inside 50.

All our contested stats, along with many others, would be dragged down by our insipid performances for the first 6 weeks. From memory the team had something like 5 contested marks in the first 3 weeks, we were abysmal. I'd love to see a comparison of the last 8 weeks compared to the first 6. I think the improvement would be obvious

All our contested stats, along with many others, would be dragged down by our insipid performances for the first 6 weeks. From memory the team had something like 5 contested marks in the first 3 weeks, we were abysmal. I'd love to see a comparison of the last 8 weeks compared to the first 6. I think the improvement would be obvious

I was going to post a similar thing. We are a much improved team over the last 8 weeks(Saints game excepted), and i think the stats would look far more favourably for us in this period.