The Habits of URC Teams so Far
Crunching the numbers to uncover the secrets of every URC Team
Now that we are halfway through the URC season, we have adequate data to begin to understand the main characteristics of each side and how they like to play the game.
How much do they rotate? What is their favourite lineout option? Do they prefer to kick, carry, or pass? Here we take a look at the data and attempt to de-code the game-plan of all 16 teams.
Kicking
We know that kicking is a vital aspect of rugby with research suggesting the teams who kick the most usually win. Here we see that Benetton, Cardiff and Ospreys kick the most in the URC and most teams are between 200 and 250 kicks so far. Intriguingly, five teams are below the 200 mark, including three of the teams in the top six. Is the URC bucking the trend?
We can also see which players teams prefer to take the majority of their kicks. Welsh and Italian teams tend to have their scrum halves do most of their kicking whereas Bulls, Connacht and Stormers prefer to kick off ten.
Players who are not registered as specialist fly-halves but do a significant proportion of their team’s kicking include Lions fullback Quan Horn and Stormers fullback Warrick Gelant whilst Leinster’s Jamie Osbourne also does a significant amount of kicking for his team.
We made a short video about Glasgow’s reluctance to kick, which you can find on our TikTok!
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Lineout
Lineout throwing is almost seen as a test of bravery. Conventional wisdom is that the more confident a team is in their lineout ability, the more likely they are to throw longer. By this logic, the Stormers play the safest with almost half of their throws going to the front.
Perhaps unexpectedly, the Dragons are the least likely to throw to the front with the majority either going middle or rear. Meanwhile, the two Scottish teams are most likely to throw to the rear.
Throws beyond the 15m are very rare, with 9/16 teams having taken that option just once. Only Zebre and Lions are using that option anywhere close to regularly.
Pass Length
When ‘long passes’ are referred to on TV they normally mean 30m+ Hollywood balls. Here, a long pass is anything above one or two metres and a short pass is anything within that. All teams throw more long passes than short, but Irish teams throw a much higher proportion of short passes whilst South African teams tend to throw fewer.
Zebre are the only team to have passed the ball less that 1,000 times, perhaps an indication of the lack of possession they often have.
Carrying
We see a very high variance in carrying statistics throughout the URC. Three out of the top four carrying teams are Irish while three of the bottom five carries are South African teams.
Plotted against gain-line success, we see that the Bulls’ efficiency with carries is remarkable, having the 3rd fewest carries but second best success at the gain-line. They are the polar opposite of Connacht who have the fourth most carries but worst gain-line success. Leinster are top of both metrics whilst the Welsh teams all have low gain-line success.
The difference between South African sides numbers and the rest may be as simple as the weather. The winter conditions in the northern hemisphere could be meaning ‘up the jumper’ rugby is increasing the carry count whilst the dry summer tracks down south encourage a much more open style.
How Possessions End
We can also investigate how team’s spells of possession tend to come to an end. Four of the most common ways for teams to lose the ball are Turnovers, Penalties, Kicks and scoring Tries. The first three give us an idea of how volatile each team is when they have the possession.
We can see that the Dragons and Sharks - the two bottom sides in the competition - are the most likely to conceded a turnover or a penalty whilst carrying. Dragons are also the most likely kick the ball away when they have it, followed by fellow Welsh region the Ospreys.
The Bulls have a remarkable try scoring rate with their tries per carry being almost 50% higher than anyone else. They are below the median for for Turnover, Penalties and Kicks but not significantly so, suggesting their attack is genuinely outstanding.
Players Used
Squad rotation is a reality of modern club rugby and has always been one of the hot topics of the URC.
At the halfway mark, most teams have used between 39 and 42 players. The outliers are Leinster and Ulster at the top who have used 47 each whilst the Lions have used a remarkably low 31.
Again, most Irish teams are towards the higher end of the count and South African down towards the lower end.
Club Summary
The below table summarises the main habits of each team for the first half of the season in the URC:
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