Stats for the outside backs

So we see de Jongh made one clean break and beat 2 defenders. Jean beat 3 in the course of the game. De Jongh at 5 metres and De Villiers at 3.5 metres per run....were still on the low  side. The outside backs made 28 tackles while only missing one (de Jongh) a defensive wall.

Obviously this represents some kind of backline edge 5 defenders beaten versus one tackle missed.

Mozart

De Jongh effectoive;ly produced NOTHING.  Beat 5 defenders making 5 meters - what a joke.   By the way I see my assessment ofhjis tackle stats was correct.  He made two clean tackles and missed one.   Where did the other five tackles come from?   He was extremely poor - so keep on saying otherwise.  Like Saffex - you never admit when you are wrong.

He made 7 tackles and missed one. And he beat 2 defenders making an average 5 metres a run...numbers aren't your friend Mike

Sorry - I was wrong about the 5 defenders - I saw two forwards being "beaten" and the third one tackled him.   But what do you mean an average of 5 meters per run - heonly made e forward move in which he made 5 Meters - why then average 5 meters gained,   Tht immplies more attacks in which he gained an average of 5 meters per run. 

One issue that is swept under the carrpet was when the first ball passsed to him he knobked on.   Remember - the ref indiccated a penalty, but alllowed for advantage and when the ball reached De Jongh he knocked it on.  No wonder the rest of the game they were hessitant to pass balls to him 

The amount of times our wingers got the ball was very little, just unacceptable really. De Jongh didn't get the ball much but he was effective in attack and is more preferable than Taute. De Jongh should remain our first choice outside centre unless Jaque Fourie returns. Mike i don't know what exactly is ur problem regarding De Jongh but he seems like a very influencial player and looks promising in attack when he gets decent ball space.

I've always regarded De Villiers as a great ball runner, however he didn't pass the ball much. If you noticed he'll rather attack the line like the crash ball player he is. i'll use the term 'Greedy' it was mainly the reason why our other backs didn't get the ball much and produced nothing. He is definitely not a team oriented player and should be dropped if he continues to play like this.
 

Lucid

I agree with you - De Jongh only got the ball twice in the game.   The first one he knocked on - the second one he advaced 5 meters (slipping two tackles by forwards)  - got tackled and the ball died with him.   Don't know why De Villiers did not pass further balls to him - but it may have something to do with that first knock on and the fear that he would repeat that if he gets the ball again - especially since he is not really a reliable attacking player...  

On todays performance and his performances in Super 15 I cannot say that De Jongh is really an influential player looking promising in attack.    The only cases where in the past year he did score three tries - when there was so much space created for him that an ox wagon could have past  through.   He rarely passed balls to other players and did not contribute anything to real attacking play during hat whole peiod.   I did notice that in CC the WP backline functioned better when he was not playing - than when he did.

Although I prior to this year always thought De Jongh was a good attacking player - his performances throughout this year was so poor - I completely lost faith in him.     

'Don't know why De Villiers did not pass further balls to him - but it may have something to do with that first knock on and the fear that he would repeat that if he gets the ball again' Let me be clear. This wasn't the case, when Jaque played on the outside this same problem occured many times, although i haven't seen it this bad. In these circumstances you can't afford to play like this and expect everything is going to go your way. It became obvious that hes not a team oriented player at all. This will certainly be the main concern in the back play leading up to the England match. Our backline passage of play is just frustrating to watch. We need get the ball to our wingers more often, where indivdual brilliance may happen.

Lucid, every week the 13's get slammed for not being influential. As I mentioned on another thread, they don't get enough good ball.The way we play doesn't help 11 14 13 to be effective. 

Dejong got the ball three times, 1 knock on, one halfbreak and 1 blunder where he didn't free devilliers up next to the touchline, this is Dejongs problem, he doesn't have the skills to put any other player into space.

I did see him run a very good line the one time, but devilliers put the ball under his arm and crashed.I've seen Taute do the same. If they did get the ball in those situations, they would have got all the praise....

During the game they put a stat up that Taute made 33m with ball in hand against Ireland which was the most of any bok. Considering the little ball he got that was good.

It was concerning to see that the one time a player used a step against Dejong he missed the tackle by a mile.(He missed 1 tackle he should have made which according to some posters here in previous weeks, makes you a bad defender).I see it as a mistake and we move on. 

The fact is that Dejong and Taute did pretty much what they could. Against Aus Taute beat his man with almost every ball, if he had someone running lines next to him he could have put them away and we would have been full of praise.

Conclusion.... We need perspective when judging players.

Rugby107
Yes our outside centres do get slammed every week for producing nothing, which is not exactly true considering the amount of opportunities they had with ball they did fairly well. I agree they don't get enough ball time, the attention is not on them, so people tend to think the performance was poor which is not rational. Clearly De Villiers is the main reason the other backs didn't get the ball much to produce. He also needs to improve on his ability to offload during the tackle, he had that issue for a while now and still can't pull it off. Watch that game again and look at the amount of times he didn't pass, just shocking really.

Lucid

i cannot account for the way De Villiers played recently - as you said he virtually never passed the ball further out - and that leaves the 13 in a bad position of not performing.   I think that the problem goes wider than the recent tests and could have been based on the instructions of the coach.   The reason for that statement is that De Villiers himself  played a different game for the Stormers.   I do not base my arguments on yesterdays game only - since as you pointed out he got the ball three times during the whole match - I thought twice, but on review found the third instance - and nothing reallly came of the second and third time - the first ball he knocked on - but his performances during Super 15 as a whole as well.   During all the games - where the got the ball more frequently - - he did with those balls exactly what he did with the balls he got yesterday.   The results always turned out zero or negative - hence the very low scoring ratio  of the Stormers in that competition.

However, the third ball De Jongh got yesterday confirms what happened in Super 15 - namely that he is not a good ball distributor as well - the ball often enough dies with him.

In summary - I think that De Jongh did nothing yesterday to confirm that he is our solution at 13 - as was the case throughout Super 15 - and that he really is not performing on an acceptable level at this stage in his career.   I do not think there is enough evidence that he can turn his performances of this year around - and I would like to see what he can produce at 13 next year.   It is unlikely that he would play on Saturday against the POMS - and if he does it could turn out to be a disaster for him.

 I don't blame Devilliers either , the same as I don't blame lambie for the kicking uppies.

The players play under instruction. It is rather obvious that Devilliers has to play the Wynand Olivier role. We look exactly the same as the bulls did under Meyer. I remember a Jean who could read the game and send out  spectacular wide passes to put Habana and co. away in the corners.This part of Jean has been nullified with a very ineffective gameplan. 

I was laughing while watching the game as I could tell exactly what we were going to do next. Every thing we do is so premeditated.

Under Jake we attacked with turnover ball, with Meyer we kick it.So stupid. You have open field runners like Dejong,Jp and hougaard, yet you kick turnover ball back to the opposition.....

Since this is a stat thread 107, I have to correct what you said about Taute. Here are his stats against Ireland:

0/2/8 says he passed twice and ran 8 times. Hardly a distributor! That means he averaged 4 metres a run for 33 metres.....less than de Jonghs 5 metres a run. And the two zeroes to the right of 33 metres are the number of defenders beaten ....zero.....and the number of clean breaks....zero.

By contrast de Jongh beat two defenders and made one clean break.

He also missed one tackle and made 7......7/1.....just like de Jongh.

 If I played as outside center I would never pass the ball if playing for the boks. It is a rare occasion to get the ball so the last thing to do is give it away to someone else?

If Jean Devilliers could offload in the tackle he would be dangerous as he is hard to pull down. It would also create allot of oppertunities for his outside players, but too greedy I suppose

 How are you correcting my stats? You just repeated what I said. The 33m.

Taute has shown in the past that he can distribute very well.Dejong hasn't. Fact.

You bang on stats way too much even though you know they don't give a true reflection of what happened. I only put the Taute stat out there to make fun of the stat issue.

Regardless I see Taute as a 15.

You say against Oz Taute beat his man with almost every ball.....here are his stats:

He passed twice, ran 7 times for 14 metres, and beat two defenders without a clean break. That makes a defender beaten less than a third of the time and an average of 2 metres a carry.

Where in blue blazes do you get these nutty ideas from. De Jongh never had a great game yesterday....but at least he made his 14 metres in only 3 carries.

 You make me laugh, Ill just shake my head.

Mozart

You got me completely baffled now.   According to all stats DE Jongh throughout the game handled the ball three times.   The first ball he knocked on, so that does not count for anything.   The second time he made a gain of 5 meters over the gain line.  The third time he got tackled before he reached the gain line.   What does the average of 5 meters mean,   Does it mean an advance from the gain line onwards - or does it mean from the place where he received the ball?    If the latter is really the case - the stats is meaningless - since centers would be tackled often enough before they reach the gain line and that effectivelt means there was a loss of territory whilst they were in possession of the ball.     In any event the famous break by De Jongh represent a gain of fve meters and the ball then died with him.   In any given game that is a meaningless achievement in the game on the whole and does not show any quality of note in respect of achievements of the center concerned.

The best I can say of De Jongh - he had a non-descript game of little value to the team as a whole.    

de Jongh did nothing of note because he got very little ball. What he did do, was miss a tackle much in the fashion of Taute missing Dagg - so bang goes the de Jongh would not have missed Taute theory and to think Dagg is twice the player the Scot was that stepped de Jongh

Was interesting to note that during that test is showed stats at various stages - the one being that Taute made the most metres out of all the Boks against Ireland with 33m

He made the most yards....but didn't beat a tackle. So what do we conclude from that? That he ran uncontested through open space.

No, he always received the ball in traffic as you do in test rugby against the big guns and with that ball he road the tacklers - something he is equipped to do given his size and something de Jongh will NEVER be able to do

He ran 33 metres in traffic but never beat a tackle. I got it, he's the invisible man.

Well done you are as sharp as ever.....he took contact and road the tackle, it was the nature of the match - what bit are you missing old man. Hell I dont remember if at any point he might have run 10m without having a defender near him - my point wise man was that for the most he took ball in traffic - FACT

He road tackles for 33 metres?  Forgive me, if I say , nonsense. Taute has an inside step, much like Olivier.....nothing else. He has no snap off the mark , no real strength in the tackle .....his lines are dog ordinary.....but he barges ahead until he meets the first tackler. Then he goes down....a perfectly ordinary talent.

Crap, he has displayed an outside step on numerous occasions, has a great step in fact and uses the swerve to good effect. At 100kg's is perfectly built for the 13 role - is able to impose himself physically both on attack and in defence. Has good pace and a far superior talent to de Jongh

I'd bet my house on the fact that Taute is going to make it as a test player and de Jongh wont - chalk and cheese stuff. Taute is the real deal, de Jongh the wee pretender.

What part of my response re traffic and metres gained did you not comprehend?

The part I don't believe, is that he rode tackles for 33 metres 8 times, without beating or breaking one of them. But those pesky Micks just hung on for dear life and went along for the ride. Now that's a laughable.

 My belief is that he ran through an open park and got knocked over by the first tackler.....he is a nice, plump slow moving target after all.

Mozart

If Taute is plump and slow moving - what is De Jongh?   Small, weak and ineffecive.   Fast he is not - just about average for a 13.    Over 50 meters he would lose by 5 meters to Jordaan and beat Taute by  2 meters.    De Jongh has shown a serious number of negatives in Super 15 - knocking on balls (Saturday was no exception), getting tackled easily (can in rare instances beat forwards from tackling him - but backline players have no problems in that regard), hand over possession to the opposition or give away peanties after beuing tackled.   All signs  of an understrength player.

For the sake of the Springboks - I hope Meyer does not pick him at 13 on Saturday   If he is the POMS are going to play the fool with him - same as the opposing teams did in Super 15   

Theres no point arguing about Taute and De Jongh as well as comparing the stats. The running metres is meaningless especially when players run in open space with no defenders that adds to the stats as well? It doesn't give a real indication how they played. Based on the amount of times De Jongh had the ball its not even worth rating his actual performance, so this argument is not logical.

De Jongh is the real deal! De Villiers just needs to give him more ball time to deliver. I'd bring back Butch James at inside centre (at least he passes)

people can bash the backs as much as they want but they are all acting to the HM overcoaching method. they have set plays and they are just doing what they are being told. HM is obsessed with a phased attack system and using the backline just bash it up and just setup another phase for the forwards to run onto the ball again and again.

Linebreaker

The "real deal"  showed zilch in Super 15 this year - and the WP backline was better without him than it was with him - so you really make me laugh about that one.    

i must admit du plessis and marche for the wp was light years ahead of de jongh and JDV that being said the game patterns were totally different