[QUOTE=“Rocko, post: 957026, member: 1”]Maybe you could provide an example of another team who have a better list of reserves at a particular position group? So far the only comparison you’ve offered is from a previous Kilkenny team from another sport. You seem to be suggesting that the KK level of depth is unprecedented in football. That might lead someone to believe that there are fewer examples of very strong benches in football and therefore Dublin’s current strength might be all the more outstanding as a result.
I’m not sure of the relevance of your reference to a % of scores taken from play, or its accuracy. Dublin certainly had no problems scoring from play last year. I’ll actually support that with facts to make it clearer:
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[]25% of Dublin’s shots in last year’s championship were goal attempts. That is a massive number, a full 67% higher than anyone else in the Championship and is an obvious reflection of an instruction to go after goals from play.
[]8% of Dublin’s shots were goals. Mayo had a slightly better statistic with just under 9% of their shots resulting in goals. Mayo had the advantage of facing London too. Dublin were second in this category and well ahead of anyone else. They certainly weren’t “down the list a bit” on that front.
[]In the All Ireland Final Dublin scored 2-9 from play and 0-3 from dead balls. Mayo scored 1-6 from play and 0-8 from dead balls. I won’t bother doing the percentages but Dublin were much higher there obviously.
[]In the semi-final Dublin had 16 scores from play to Kerry’s 11. Dublin had 20 scores in all, Kerry had 14. That’s a higher score for Dublin and a slightly higher percentage of scores from play for Dublin, though again I’m not really sure why that is any indication of how good a forward line is, considering forwards are usually fouled for scores.
[]In the quarter-final against Cork, Dublin had 10 scores from play, contributing 1-09. Cork had 9 scores, all points. Dublin had 0-7 from the ground against Cork’s 0-5. You could argue that Dublin were more reliant than Cork on dead balls because they scored more there but that would be entirely missing the point that Dublin scored more from play than Cork. As a percentage Cork were about half a percent less reliant on dead balls, which serves only to illustrate how meaningless the percentage stat is.
[]It’s a similar story for the Leinster Final. Dublin scored more from play and from dead balls than Meath. The percentages are fairly even. Dublin got 2-08 from play and 0-7 from dead balls. Meath got 0-9 from play and 0-5 from dead balls. It would take a real twist in logic to suggest that Dublin scoring more from play and more from dead balls meant anything other than Dublin had a better set of forwards.
[]Against Kildare it was 4-10 from play and 0-6 from dead balls. That’s 78% of the Dublin total from play.
[]Dublin scored 1-17 from play and 0-5 from dead balls against Westmeath. That’s 80% of their scores coming from play. Not much point in even working out what Westmeath got.
[*]All those totals compare very favourably to an average in the 2012 championship of 9 scores from play for teams. I cannot see how Dublin are down the list. It may be possible to construct an irrelevant and meaningless stat that dilutes scores from play by the fact that they also scored from dead balls. Even if you do that, I doubt Dublin would be very far from the top based on those figures above. And it wouldn’t be proving much anyway.
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That’s a hell of alit of stats for missing the point. I was talking about overall shots from play turned into scores. Obviously one barometer of a forward line.
The strength of Dublin is the amount of possession they can attain.
The going for goals is an interesting stat though, very high indeed and may account for some of the % loss on shots from play. Still missing a fair chunk though so either the goalkeepers in GAA are superb or the decision making is not 100%.
Still not an “incredible” bench though.
Kerry have had Tommy Walsh, Darran O Sullivan and Paul Galvin to come off the bench in the past. I’d take it any day over that Dublin list in the times we’re talking about.
Cork have had Goulding, Donnacha O Connor, Kerrigan & Paddy Kelly on the line this year. 4 All Stars. I’d take that experience off the bench over the Dublin bench as a whole. Although Kerrigan will definitely start in championship. If you are going to throw unproven lads like Costello in I’ll throw Barry O Driscoll, Colm O Driscoll, Cathal Vaughan and Alan Cadagon in.
Cork don’t have a better team, but overall they have a better selection of forwards.
Again this goes back to where Dublins real strengths are.
Vastly improved defending from Rory O Carroll, John Cooper and Cian I Sullivan where ever he plays these days (or last year as it wen on, I realise he’s missed a lot since) and a system and Licence to attack that suits the backs they have. Speed and work rate are also great strengths and a general ability to win ball in the middle sector an of course MDM who is a machine physically and a force of nature and an inspiration an also the pure efficiency of Flynn.
Their forward ability, although it is still an excellent forward line is not their strongest point and vital scores have come from further back like MDM, Cluxton and McCafferky.
They get and waste a lot of chances. Which is fine, that’s a quite accepted and obviously successful tactical approach. But it’s based on 1-9 more than an amazing forward line.