Right Rugby
Served cool, shaken not stirred

La Irb ha rilasciato il lavoro del suo Dipartimento di analisi sulla Coppa del Mondo 2007: 78 pagine di numeri e statistiche qui linkate, imperdibili per comprendere come e dove va il rugby giocato.
Nel mentre godiamo al pensiero del mal di testa che tutte quelle cifre procureranno al "classicone" Brett :) , per facilitare riportiamo un excerpt dall'executive summary del documento:

"Rugby World Cup proved once again that winning a world cup is quite a
different proposition from winning a championship. When a tournament
has a knock-out stage, then the dynamics suddenly change – and, in RWC
2007, some of the changes were remarkable.
In one area however, there was no surprise. South Africa, the winning
team, produced the sort of rugby throughout the tournament that was
consistent with its approach in the period leading up to it. Their game was
based on a strong set piece, an aggressive defence and an ability to turn
transgressions into points. In RWC 2007, it proved highly successful.
Their own lineout was as successful as any, they managed more lineout
steals than any other team, and had an effective scrum. Securing
possession was not seen as the ultimate objective – pressure was the
priority - and their kick at goal rate was at the satisfactory 75% mark.
In addition, but excluding the final where no tries were scored, they scored
tries at a consistent level throughout the tournament with match try
counts of 8,3,4,9,5, and 4.

With several of the other teams, however, matters proved far less
predictable. Before RWC 2007 started, there appeared to be a clear favourite.
New Zealand’s record over the last several years had been outstanding.
They had done all this through pursuing a clearly identified approach that
was not replicated by their rivals. New Zealand saw all their players as
distributors of the ball while most other countries saw forwards as
providers and just the backs as distributors.
(..) Successful as the New Zealand approach had been, the one question
that was critical therefore was whether an expansive approach would
stand up under the pressure of a winner-take-all knockout competition.
It did not – and this has never been more dramatically illustrated than in
the France v New Zealand quarter final game. (..)
Instead of creating 43 rucks [come nella loro ultima sfida con la Francia, ndr],
New Zealand created 165 or almost 4 times as many.
This was around 100 more than a normal New Zealand game; was around
50% higher than the next highest in the tournament and is almost certainly
the highest figure ever seen in an international match.
It was at a scale that New Zealand had never remotely experienced before
with an often seen expansive approach being replaced by forward attrition.
The successful formula of recent years had been abandoned for some reason
and New Zealand found themselves out of the competition.
[La nostra personale versione is slightly different: la battaglia d'attrito davanti fu cosi' abnorme "for some reasons", not to mention i circa dieci minuti di tempo di gioco in piu' rispetto alla media; chapeau quindi alla superba difesa francese, ma pur riconoscendo che i campioni sono quelli che vincono le sfide decisive nonostante tutto e tutti, gli indizi identificano a nostro avviso con chiarezza il vero colpevole (l'arbitro inglese). ndr]

The same could also be said however of their conquerors in that game –
France. When they beat England, their semi final opponent by 22 points
to 9, only a month or so before the tournament started, they kicked the
ball just 19 times. In the RWC semi final however, against the same
opponents, they kicked the ball 46 times and lost. Again, the perceived
safety of kicking into the opponents half outweighed a possible
alternative strategy that could have resulted in a different outcome.

It was not just New Zealand and France however that reacted in such a
way at the thought of sudden death. Other teams also saw safety and
comfort in kicking at a hugely accelerated rate.
While all internationals produce around 55 kicks per game, this figure
was dwarfed at the knock out stages of RWC 2007. The final produced 91
kicks and the semi finals 86 and 85.
Attempted drop goals also reflected the difficulty in producing tries at the
latter stages of the tournament. As the tournament progressed, so drop
goals were attempted far more frequently. Successes however were few
and far between. Of the 29 attempted drop goals at the knock out stage
only 2 were successful, a success rate of just 7% compared to the more
usual 25-30%. What such attempts did however was confirm the view
that – for whatever reason - tries are difficult to find at RWC.
But does this have to be? Is the only route to success at RWC one where
creativeness has to be secondary to risk aversion?

One team certainly did not think so – Fiji.
Based on an analysis of set piece play, Fiji should have perished far
earlier and far more comprehensively. They were the least successful of
all 20 teams at the lineout – both on their own and their opponents’
throw. They were also the least successful of all 20 teams at maintaining
possession at the scrum and had a 0% success on their opponents put in.
What they did however was attempt to play in the way that they knew
best and what they were best at. In their matches against Wales and South
Africa, they made just 19 kicks in each game while outpassing both their
opponents quite comfortably. They also scored 6 tries in what proved to
be a hugely successful approach. In achieving this, perhaps they also laid
down a marker – that a team’s approach to matches outside RWC can be
replicated at the tournament if the fear of losing can be overcome and it
can concentrate on what it does best.

There was another general consensus before the competition started. This
concerned Tier 2 and Tier 3 countries. These so called ‘minnows’ (..)
while the points differences in matches between Tier 1 teams and Tier 2 teams
was in fact slightly greater in RWC 2007 than in RWC 2003, it was also slightly
greater when Tier 1 teams played each other. (..) Georgia came close to
beating Ireland, Tonga almost beat South Africa with the last move of the
game, Romania were just edged out by Italy while Fiji beat Wales and
found themselves in the quarter finals and within clutching distance of a
semi final.
What happened in RWC was that Tier 2 and Tier 3 countries played for
80 minutes. In the past, less experienced teams could sometimes hold
their own for the first hour or so before being overwhelmed in the last
quarter. This did not happen in RWC 2007 (..)
Like Tier 1 countries, they scored just over 60% of their tries in the second
half and conversely – just as Tier1 teams – conceded 40% of their tries in the first. Frequently, they were competitive right to the end (..)."