Quantium data analysis: True player ownership stats, Round 4

Actuary Adam Driussi provides player ownership breakdowns to allow you to differ your side from those atop the rankings.

NRL

Apologies for the delay in this week’s article…work called!

Let’s take a look at the true player ownership stats entering Round 5 – remember that these stats are prior to any trades made this week!

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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. 

65% of the top 5,000 teams now own Reece Walsh compared to just 8% who own James Tedesco.  2 weeks ago, just 3% of the top 100,000 owned Walsh – that is now a huge 41%.

I feel for those who did hold Teddy.  What looked like a sweet POD turned into a nightmare as he went down early with a HIA – bleeding both points and further cash – and likely forcing a trade next week.  12% of the top 20,000 owned Teddy prior to trades this week.

CTW

CTW is stacked with good options so far this season.  Players like Garrick, Kiraz and Val Holmes continue to deliver whilst heavily owned cheapies such as Alamoti, AKP, Warbrick and Turuva are generating plenty of cash.

Jacob Kiraz was owned by 1% of teams two weeks ago but is now owned by 42% of the top 20,000 teams and 50% of the top 1,000.

Lachlan Miller and Nick Meaney are both skewed towards the leading teams whilst Brian To’o, Joseph Suaalii and Izaac Thompson are all skewed away from the leaders.

Five-eighth

Five-eighth is proving to be a challenging position so far this season.  Many teams owned Kalyn Ponga or Matt Burton early and sold, with Adam Doueihi looking the standout buy. 

Doueihi has looked anything but convincing in the past two weeks and many owners are now scrambling to sell.

At the same time, Josh Schuster keeps missing games which impacts 60% of the top 10,000 teams.  As a Doueihi owner I’m going to hold but I don’t love it.

Halfback

It is all happening at halfback.  Not surprisingly, the leading teams are hugely skewed towards those that own Nicho Hynes after his 180 point masterclass last week. 

Many teams will have moved hell and high water to bring Nicho in this week – me included.

Making things interesting at least is Nathan Cleary.  With less than 50% of the top 100,000 teams owning Cleary – and just 27% of the top 100 he is actually a semi-POD for owners. 

His 124 point score tonight certainly rewarded those of us who sticked solid and own both Cleary and Hynes. 

To give you an idea, prior to trades this week, just 15% of the top 20,000 teams owned both Cleary and Hynes.

2RF

100% of the top 5,000 teams now own J’maine Hopgood.  I wonder if that will change after this round.

Jacob Preston is now the third most owned 2RF with 71% of the top 20,000 teams owning him. 

His ownership amongst the top 100,000 has increased from 20% to 52% in the past fortnight.

Zac Hosking was owned by just 30 of the top 10,000 teams heading into this week.  That will be a very different story after next week if he gets named to start again on Tuesday.

FRF

We’ve seen a surprising amount of player ownership changes to FRF over the past fortnight. 

Reuben Cotter’s injury and disappointing scores have seen owners sell, with the likes of Payne Haas, Tohu Harris and Tom Gilbert soaring in ownership. 

HOK

Soni Luke’s head injury last week impacted 22% of the top 1,000 teams. 

Approximately 20% of the top 10,000 teams don’t own Harry Grant – that must be a hard watch every week. 

He was everywhere again tonight and was inches away from scoring 110.

Round 4 captaincy selection

Not surprisingly, Round 4 was all about Nicho Hynes as captain. 

Whilst only 7% of the top 100,000 captained Nicho, a whopping 71% of the 1,000 captained him!

For those who captained him – hats off.  To the rest of us, let’s hang in there and remember that there will be lots of other opportunities to make amends.

Good luck to everyone in Round 5.  I’m off to Homebush hoping the Dogs can knock off the Cowboys!

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