It was a brave decision by Gary Hetherington at the start of the month to effectively lay the blame for the clubs slump squarely at the feet of the players. It’s often the coach that is removed in these circumstance, already this season we have seen Royce Simmons lose his job after a similar poor run of form at St Helens. But is that the right course of action?
Certainly it is cheaper to replace one man rather than half a team. It’s also true that fans form more of a bond with players meaning its often more acceptable, indeed expected, by the fans that the coach will go. But is that the right course of action?
By publically confirming that he lays the blame at the players feet Hetherington has spun convention on its head. Afterall, this is a team that has won the Grand Final 4 out of the last 5 years. If that’s failure then every other team in the country aspires to fail as much as Leeds. So is Gary Hetherington right, is it the players fault?
What Hetherington is suggesting is that the current squad has perhaps ‘run its race’. You can interpret this many ways, but the collective wisdom is to take this to mean that many of the players that have been part of the squad over the recent cup laden years are past their best. That helps us to target the players he is talking about. Because of that I have targeted players who have played over 100 league games including playoffs (roughly 4 seasons accounting for the number of grand finals reached in that time) at the club. That accounts for 12 out of the current squad of 30.
There are of course many ways you can measure a players performance. There are clean breaks, tackles made, tackles missed, handling errors, decisive passes and so on. However, there is one crucial statistic that if you get right makes the rest irrelevant. If you score more tries than your opponents you will win far more games than you lose. With that in mind, I have homed in on that trait in the table below.
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Av
Carl Ablett N/A 0.00 0.08 0.20 0.24 0.11 0.21 0.27 0.16
Ryan Bailey 0.08 0.07 0.12 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.12 0.11 0.06
Rob Burrow 0.68 0.45 0.46 0.45 0.36 0.25 0.40 0.27 0.42
Ryan Hall N/A N/A 0.30 0.69 1.07 0.89 1.04 0.87 0.81
JJB 0.28 0.21 0.17 0.21 0.29 0.15 0.42 0.17 0.24
Ian Kirke N/A 0.14 0.04 0.09 0.06 0.08 004 0.00 0.06
Kylie Leuluai N/A N/A 0.03 0.22 0.10 0.00 0.14 0.07 0.09
Danny McGuire 0.73 1.14 0.57 0.67 0.44 0.89 0.71 1.00 0.77
Jamie Peacock N/A 0.12 0.07 0.07 0.28 0.00 0.07 0.00 0.09
Kevin Sinfield 0.23 0.09 0.17 0.14 0.15 0.17 0.07 0.07 0.14
Lee Smith 0.67 0.41 0.44 0.55 0.52 0.44 0.40 0.00 0.43
Brent Webb N/A N/A N/A N/A 0.63 0.29 0.55 0.17 0.41

What it shows is that 66.67% of our ‘senior’ players are scoring less tries in this season so far than their average. Those whose average is in red are below their average this season, those in green are above. Interestingly, if we did it based on last seasons figures only 50% would be below. This would seem to support Hetherington’s notion that the players are not as good this season as last. But is it that clear cut? Do we really need stats to show us we are not scoring as much when the league table as good as tells us that anyway? The table below shows that we are actually scoring less points this season than at anytime in the last 7 years, and we are also conceding more.
win% Av For Av Agn Av Points Per Game
2012 52.94 26.76 24.82 1.06
2011 58.62 28.10 22.17 1.21
2010 62.96 26.85 20.78 1.30
2009 79.31 29.31 16.66 1.59
2008 77.78 31.96 15.30 1.56
2007 66.67 27.67 18.04 1.37
2006 67.86 31.04 19.39 1.36

If we compare the current campaign to that of the free scoring 2008 there is a difference of over 16% in terms of points scored per game. In 2008 our senior players scored a total of 3.29 tries per game and the same set of players have scored 2.98 so far this season, a difference of just 9%.
This suggests that yes, we are scoring less this season, but actually, it’s not just the senior players that are accountable. In fact, it is the non senior players that are more accountable because if we remove Kirke who is the only player to have been outside the matchday 17 more often than he has been in it the 11 senior players account for 65% of the matchday squad, but only 56% of the drop in tries per game. Therefore the other 35% of the matchday squad are accountable for 44% of the reduction in tries scored.
The net effect of all this is that whilst the senior players level of performance has dropped this season, they are performing better than the non senior players. So perhaps rather than suggesting the current squad has run its course Mr Hetherington would be better served looking at the level of players that have left the squad since 2008 and those he has replaced them with, because by my reckoning, they are of inferior quality.

Clarkey?

If you read it in his voice it's almost spot on!

What about the key performance indicators, Phil?

And I thought I needed to get a life.

Don't get me wrong I appreciate the odd stat every now and again but like WMD's you wouldn't want them falling into the wrong hands. Does this mean they'll be no more 'can Leeds go undefeated' threads?

The answer to your opening question is NO (IMO) but I'm afraid that's only based on a gut feeling rather than how many tries Ryan Bailey may or may not have scored in any given season.

Can you show your workings?

After reading through all of that my conclusion is..........i deserve a fecking medal for doing so.

Also a lack of tries doesn't simply come down to players alone, poor attacking structure and game plans made by the coach can also be at fault for this as you can't always relay on individual brilliance to get over the line you need good team play which should come from McDermott's coaching. He isn't coaching them to respect the art of building pressure (if he is then they're ignoring him badly) which would lead to more tries if we did.

For example, Ryan Hall, in 2009 he's at 1.07 compared to 2012's 0.87. Was he a better player in '09 than he is now? No, he's as good as ever but the guy struggles to get any decent ball as we are so poorly set up atm and under a different coach he could of possibly doubled the amount of tries he's already scored so far this year.

Wow

IMHO (hope that satisfies the Southstander gestapo )....no !

I still believe it's not so much lack of effort and desire from the players but lack of ideas, discipline and structure to their game. That to me suggests a lack of good coaching.

Jesus wept. After reading all that waste of expensive bandwidth, I feel like going outside and throwing myself in a puddle!

Have you been living in a cave for the past 6 months Fallon? (or as you might opine 0.35% of my alloted lifespan)

It's all been done to death .....including pointing the finger at the traditional villain of the piece. the Head Coach.

Are you by any chance related to Rhinoswinorlose?

I like lists.

What Mr Hetherington says and what he thinks are two different things. He had to say something but I'd take it all with a pinch of salt - wait and see!

You've said that a couple of times now RF what does he actually think???

What we need is some classic Damo. 50 things that are wrong with Leeds Rhinos

McDermott given to the end of the season to win something or he will be gone along with a couple of others on contracts that extend past this year.
I think that is what RF is getting at hey Mr Francis