It is.

In his stint he seemed to really struggle getting back in the line, but you can't argue with that.

Coupling quantity with quality is worthy of praise more sure. But he's only able to get the quantity because his team was constantly having to defend.

It's like a new car company saying "99% of our cars are repairable in under 1 hour!". It looks an impressive stat but the car manufacturer down the road might engineer the cars not to break down in the first place.

Not sure where this idea that any one team makes considerably more tackles than any other comes from. Of course there is a range and yes it has to be factored in but does it dilute tackle effectiveness when viewed as a % over 28 weekly rounds?

In 2010 Salford made the most completed tackles. (I can't comment on absolute tackle numbers as the reported team missed tackle stat is less than useless and I'm not identifying every squad member for every team and adding them together to get to an accurate figure, not today at any rate.)

The completed tackle figure for Salford in 2010 was (when rounded) between 1 and 13% greater than the other SL sides.

1% - Huddersfield
2% - Les Catalans
3% - Harlequins, Hull KR
4% - Crusaders
6% - Hull
7% - Wakefield
9% - Bradford
10% - Leeds, Wigan
11% - Castleford
12% - Warrington
13% - St Helens

I suspect Malcolm Alker would still figure highly even if he had played in a team that found themselves towards the bottom of that list.

Yardage (or metreage) from Pitts and Kirke is poor for forwards. Also Senior. If he's only making those kind of yards he won't fare as well in the forwards as you may think.

Come on TVOC you're an intelligent man?! Surely you're not trying to suggest I'm being stupid by suggesting that the "Top Tackler" award isn't something that you really want to be winning??

It is perfectly reasonable to suggest (as I did) that the "weaker" teams are likely to have made more tackles, given that they will have less possession, and therefore are likely to be defending more, meaning they're more likely to have a "Top Tackler".

All I was saying is the Sky boys saying stuff like... "Alker really is one of the top tacklers in the game!" in the positive tone and manor that they do isn't right. He's only the "Top Tackler" because his team are getting caned every week so he's having to put the tackles in. I'm positive he'd have rather played for Wigan and spent more time with the ball in his hands.

Maybe TVOC could routinely convert Kirke's metres into centimetres? It might sound less depressing.

Aw!!

Why wouldn't you want the top tackler in SL in your team even using quantity alone to define it? That player would be one of the first names on my team-sheet.

What I'm suggesting is that Alker would still be one of the top tacklers in the game regardless of the team he plays/played for (which I understood your position to be re Salford) because 1) he played a high percentage of games 2) he played long minutes each week 3) he played in the middle of the park and 4) he was a very good defender.

Whether Salford were called on to make what (in percentage terms) may have been slightly more tackles on average in any given season doesn't detract from the other factors listed above.

Good to see the stats thanks again.

I'm not say you "wouldn't want the top tackler", meaning if one of your plays WAS the top tackler you'd actively seek to get rid of him. I'm just suggesting that perhaps most people would rather win the league than have the top tackler.

1. Dallas Johnson - Catalans 1106
2. Malcolm Alker - Salford 964
3. Heath L'Estrange - Bradford 944
4. Luke Swain - Salford 910
5. Danny Houghton - Hull 843
6. Lincoln Withers - Crusaders 834
7. Craig Fitzgibbon - Hull 829
8. Rhys Lovegrove - Hull Kingston Rovers 787
9. Sean O'Loughlin - =#FF0040Wigan 783
10. Ryan Hudson - Castleford 773

Top ten tacklers contains one member of what are considered "the best 4 teams in the league" and even he came 9th. Really can't see why you're arguing with me on this TVOC, surely you get my point?

Who's arguing?

I'm appreciating the defensive attributes of a player and don't believe it's perverse in any way for Sky, Opta, Man Of Steel or whoever to celebrate the achievement. One for the unsung heroes.

Fair enough.

I just personally don't think it's especially "heroic" to be circumstantially an 80 minute player in the middle of the park for a team who's often on the losing side of the possession stat.

It's the equivalent of giving an award to the goalkeeper who picks the ball out of the back of his own net the most times.