Quantium data analysis: Rd 6, vital numbers to beat the best

Analysing the top 100,000 NRL Supercoach teams after Round 5

Well, I’m certainly glad round 5 is over – what a frustrating week!

Like many Supercoaches, after a poor opening month, I finally cut ties with Kotoni Staggs last week.  To watch him then post a score of 108 was frustrating to say the least!

Similarly, after spending the week tossing up between Ryan Papenhuyzen and Nicholas Hynes at captain, it hurt to watch Hynes post a score of 117 after Paps produced a disappointing 39.  All that after having already seen 9% of teams captain Teddy who scored a miserly 28.

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To add insult to injury, I also made a big POD move to bring in Cody Walker instead of Dylan Brown. Not only did Walker post a score of 10, but he didn’t look great to the eye.  My decision not to bring in Brown in Round 2 continues to cost me points and dollars!

In better news, I stuck solid with David Fifita and was finally rewarded with his first big play and tonne of the year.  I hope that spurs the big man onto similar heroics going forward. 

Let’s get into our analysis of the top 100,000 teams.

Fullback

The table below sets out the proportion of teams in the top 100, top 1,000, top 5,000, top 10,000, top 20,000 and top 100,000 that own each fullback. 

FLB rankings are dominated by three players – Nicholas Hynes, Ryan Papenhuyzen and James Tedesco.  I see Teddy is the second most sold player so far this week – surely, he is a hold?

CTW

There were four tonnes at CTW last week, led by Jesse Ramien. In fact, the Sharks now have two of the four highest scoring CTWs this year in Ramien and Sione Katoa.  Both are owned by just a handful of teams.

Despite his huge score, Kotoni Staggs is owned by just 6% of the top 100 teams and 7% of the top 5,000.  That’s some small comfort for those of us who sold.

Taylan May posted another huge score and averages 96 through three rounds of NRL.  With a price rise last week of $155k…and likely another $200k to come in the next few weeks…how do 2% of the top 100 (teams 28 and 64) and 3% of the top 5,000 teams NOT own May?! 

Dane Gagai is the third highest scoring CTW this year but is surprisingly owned by just 1% of the top 100 and 2% of the top 5,000 versus 10% of the top 100,000 teams.

Five-eighth

After disappointing his owners last week, Cameron Munster reminded owners of his class with a score of 84.  He is now owned by just over 50% of the top 20,000 teams.

Thomas Dearden continues to play well and is actually the second highest scoring five-eighth this year.

Halfback

Nicho Hynes and Mitch Moses are dominating at halfback this year. Nathan Cleary is lurking though.

With a projected price fall of $150k in the next fortnight, Supercoaches will likely watch on as Cleary plays the Broncos and Raiders – only to then look at bringing him in when the Panthers play the Titans, Eels, Storm and Roosters leading into the Origin period. That is looming as a very tricky decision.

2RF

There was quite a bit of trade action at 2RF last week.  Looking at the top 100,000 teams, 8% of teams traded out Ethan Bullemor, 6% traded out David Fifita (ouch) and 4% traded out Patrick Carrigan.

On the flipside, 22% of the top 100,000 teams traded in Siosifa Talakai (including 36% of the top 20,000), 4% traded in Beau Fermor and 2% traded in each of Isaiah Papali’i and Viliame Kikau.

FRF

Josh King continues to deliver in spades for his owners.

The 90%+ of teams in the top 20,000 who own Payne Haas are forced to make other plans this week as he serves a one game ban. The only saving grace is that almost all teams are in the same boat.  I suspect Max King will earn a starting berth for most teams.

HOK

Round 5 saw further consolidation in ownership of Harry Grant at HOK.  15% of the top 20,000 teams now own Grant compared with 43% last week.  In contrast, Api Koroisau and Reed Mahoney’s ownership each fell by 5% and Connor Watson fell by 3%.

Round 5 Captaincy Choices

Round 5 saw a reversal of round 4.  Last week, 1% more teams had Hynes as captain and Papenhuyzen outscored him by 149.

This week, 31% had Paps and 30% had Hynes – only for Hynes to outscore Paps by 78.  Well played to those teams who went Paps then Hynes – and bad luck to those who went Hynes and then Paps!   

James Tedesco was the third most popular captain and flopped for his owners.  Interestingly, Taylan May was the ninth most popular captain last week, including 2% of the top 5,000 sides. 

This week gets much more challenging.  With the Storm playing the Sharks, I’m assuming plenty of teams will look beyond Papenhuyzen, Hynes and Harry Grant. With Payne Haas also out, that is a lot of the popular captains each week either out or tough to select.

Ordinarily, James Tedesco against the Warriors would be a popular choice – but the fact Teddy is the second most traded out player suggests that there are question marks there too.  I suspect Mitch Moses will be very popular amongst the teams who own him.  An Easter Monday clash against the Tigers looks juicy for Moses.

Good luck again to everyone in Round 6.

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