Originally posted by go team
no one thus far have seemed to explain why?
The Essendon's back six have an edge in experience and talent.. Welsh, Fletcher, Lucas and Wellman are all A-Grade defenders...
Granted Adelaide's defence has probably have had less kicked against them on average this year (alot of this would have to do with the bombers getting thrashed first round without most of their back six)
Midfield and through the centre pretty much break even..
Ricciuto, McLeod are superstarts, Burton is a champ, and Clarke is a quality ruckman. Very impressive. Jason Johnson, Mark Johnson & James Hird are quality footballers. You'd be hard pressed to find somone that would rate the bomber midfield superior, or for that matter even rate the bomber midfield at all, but for the crap the Essendon midfield get, they are ahead of the crows in total disposals and contested ball gets in 2004. The Hille and Allan ruck combo get better and better every week.. and when comparing the stats on clearances both teams break about even, with Essendon winning more centre bounce and the crows taking more away from the throw ins.. 50/50
Selective stats farming is a great hobby, isn't it?
For example, why don't you have a gander at the stats for points against Adelaide's defence versus points against bombers defence last year?
From a Crows fan POV, Adelaide's midfield would wipe the floor with Essendons midfield, as demonstrated quite vividly when these two teams met at AAMI Stadium last year.
Why don't you have a gander at the stats for ruck hitouts for Adelaide's ruck versus Essendons ?
Why don't you have a look at the head-to-head record of these two sides at AAMI ?
Essendon seem to be more dangerous up foward than the crows: Matty Lloyd is one of the premier full fowards in the comp, more importantly other bombers are kicking goals this year.. Essendon's top four goal kickers have kicked around 10 or so more goals than the crows top four goal kickers in 2004..
Both teams have had equal inside 50s and marks inside 50s, yet the Essendon foward line have a superior conversion rate.
Agree with this. The Crows have had a dismal 2004 to date. !!
Hopefully they can get better & move ahead of Essendon.
to top it all off, according to the pro-stats website:
http://www.prowess.com.au/pro-stats/
The bombers have the edge in 1%ers & have less handling errors
After all that, I'd say on paper (and keep in mind i'm extremely biased and know little about the crows), the essendon line up has an edge in experience and talent..
Now i'm not saying this guarantees victory..
but to me, the only thing going for Adelaide is that they are
If you look at
all the stats, say over the past 3 years, I think you will find that Adelaide comes out consistently ahead of the bombers, but only slightly. The Crows have finished ahead of Essendon each of those years ... but only slightly.
The Crows have their fair share of talent - just that names like Ricciuto, Goodwin, McLeod, Edwards, Clarke, Stenglein, McGregor and others don't feature much in Melbourne media. Carey's name would feature more than almost any of those names, but Carey wouldn't be as important to the team. Go figure. But this is perhaps the reason why you imagine on paper the Essendon side has the edge in talent ... you are just more familiar with the Essendon names than the others.
I also find it somewhat amusing that the reason the Crows were lowly-rated in this pre-season was that the Crows were said to be too old. Now we have a visitor to the board saying his side has the edge in experience !!
The Crows have had a regrettable start to 2004 with some poor form, but maybe they have turned it around now.
Then again, maybe not. Friday will tell us.
PS: - Fletcher might be a different player in Melbourne, but here at AAMI Stadium last year he was a complete bozo. He got thrashed by welsh, and he lost the plot & nearly got himself reported. He was a sizeable factor in why Bombers lost the game.