SuperCoach Plus: 11 things you need to know for round 2 of the 2023 AFL season

What went wrong for Rory Laird – and Nat Fyfe? Get the inside numbers to help you make the big KFC SuperCoach calls including this week’s top captain picks.

Some coaches are riding high after round 1, many others are picking up the pieces.

One week is a long time in KFC SuperCoach and there is plenty of time to bounce back. And SuperCoach Plus is here to help.

SuperCoach Plus is a treasure trove of stats and tools including Break Evens, score and price projections, a bye planner, the Optimise and Trade Assist buttons and lots more. And SuperCoach Plus subscribers can see live KFC SuperCoach scores for every AFL game in the 2023 season.

And you get exclusive weekly analysis articles just like this one!

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1. LAIRD GOES UNDERGROUND

After scoring at least 92 points in his past 35 matches (and over 100 in 32 of those) the competition’s leading disposal-winner of 2022 had a shocker against the Giants on Sunday. Laird’s 18 disposals were his fewest in any match since 2018 (excluding 2020), and his 50 KFC SuperCoach points was his lowest score since round 19, 2014. Laird’s quarter-by-quarter scoring is tough reading – 28, eight, seven, eight. He spent 51 minutes on Tom Green but there was no tag – and in another very un-Laird like stat, he recorded just two effective tackles from six attempts. He said on Adelaide radio the Giants had done a great job of breaking his connection with the Crows midfield, and the 35-degree conditions were some of the toughest he had played in: “I found it hard to do effort-to-effort and that probably replicated my output and influence on the game, which I didn’t really have any. I haven’t played anything like that before in 203 games, and I hope I don’t have to anytime soon.”

He has the perfect chance to bounce back on Saturday against Richmond, a team he averages 112 against in their past five encounters.

Rory Laird had a rare poor score in round 1. Picture: The Advertiser/ Morgan Sette

2. FYFE FLOP

Speaking of round 1 shockers, Nat Fyfe – owned by 36 per cent of KFC SuperCoach teams – produced the lowest score of his 210-game career against St Kilda. Fyfe recorded just nine disposals and lost 14.5 points from negative acts made up of two clanger kicks, three free kicks against and a dropped mark. At least he improved after halftime after having just one point to his name at the main break.

3. EFFICIENCY MATTERS

Using the ball well is a key element of KFC SuperCoach scoring, and we saw examples on both sides in round 1. Charlie Constable’s 1980s type kick-to-handball ratio of 23 kicks and three handballs is something we don’t often see in the modern game. But to his detriment he had five clanger kicks (minus 17.1 points) and 11 ineffective kicks, worth zero points. In contrast, Hayden Young hit the target with 16 of his 17 kicks at Marvel Stadium on Sunday. He scored 52.4 points from effective kicks alone. Constable finished with 26 disposals and 56 KFC SuperCoach points while Young tallied 137 points from just four more touches.

0 clangers for Cam Mackenzie on debut 🔥 #SuperCoach

— The Phantom (@ThePhantomSC) March 20, 2023

4. TIMMY THE TIGER

Tim Taranto has never been known for his precision kicking, and on Thursday night he lost 25 points from seven clanger disposals and a free kick against. But he made up for it with a game-high 32 disposals, 29.8 points from tackles and another 28.9 from contested possessions. His 101,154 owners would be pleased with his 103 point return.

Jason Horne-Francis scored 136 KFC SuperCoach points in round 1. Picture: Mark Brake/Getty Images

5. JHF EXPLODES

Jason Horne-Francis is the most traded in player this week after his electric Port Adelaide debut. Horne-Francis went head-to-head with Brisbane’s vaunted midfield – attending 20 centre bounces – and dominated. The Power’s star recruit won a team-high eight pre-clearance disposals and seven pre-clearance contested possessions. He had a massive third term which earned him 72 points, collecting 11 disposals, three clearances, five inside-50s and three score assists. In total 19 of 25 disposals were effective and he was involved in 10 scoring chains. If he produced a similar performance against Collingwood this week he’ll be a must-have before round 3.

6. TRADE TRENDS

More than 19,000 coaches saw enough in Horne-Francis’s electric performance to trade him into their teams for round 2. Harry Sheezel (13k), Conor McKenna (12k) and Nick Daicos (12k) are the other top targets so far this week, and 8000 coaches are hoping Dane Rampe can repeat his 150-point return in round 1. Tom Stewart is the most traded out player, leaving 25,000 teams, while Liam Jones (19k trades) and Nat Fyfe (16k) are also being shown the door in big numbers. Some of the more exotic moves include the 10 people trading Fyfe to Nick Larkey, 16 trading Fyfe to Sam Weideman, three people trading Fyfe to Jack Riewoldt, while two players are making a big move by trading Fyfe in – for Ben King.

Thousands of coaches have lost patience with Nat Fyfe. Picture: Chris Hyde/Getty Images

7. MARKET WATCH

Player prices don’t start to change until after their third game, so we can get another look at players this round before their values rise or fall. Price movements are based on a three-round rolling average, so round 1 scores will be factored in for the first price change. That’s not good news for Rory Laird owners – he has to score 206 against Richmond to maintain his price. Otherwise he could be about $100k cheaper in a couple of weeks. The same goes for other high-priced players including Andrew Brayshaw, Lachie Neale, Clayton Oliver and Jack Steele. At the other end of the scale Kade Chandler, Harry Sheezel and Conor McKenna are among the cheapies looking at a likely price spike – but we’ll know a lot more after we have two games of data.

8. CENTRE BOUNCE BUZZ

CBAs (centre bounce attendances) became the buzzword of the pre-season as SuperCoaches hunted players who could improve their output this season. And round 1 revealed some very interesting numbers. Connor Rozee (83 per cent CBAs), Tim Taranto (80 per cent), Will Setterfield (74 per cent), Jason Horne-Francis (67 per cent) and Errol Gulden (50 per cent) all saw big jumps from last year, while Clayton Oliver (83 per cent) resumed business as usual after a slight dip in the pre-season. But neither Nick Daicos or Nat Fyfe attended a single centre bounce, Finn Callaghan attended one, Sam Flanders four and Tanner Bruhn 16, ranked sixth at Geelong. Rowan Marshall was the only player in round 1 to attend 100 per cent of CBAs.

Errol Gulden averaged 10 per cent CBAs in 2022. Picture: Phil Hillyard

9. KICK-IN KINGS

Shannon Hurn was the round 1 kick-in king, taking 10 kick-ins from North Melbourne behinds and playing on from every one of them. Jordan Dawson also generated a significant portion of his score from playing on from seven of his eight kick-ins, while Charlie Constable took six kick-ins for Gold Coast and played on from all six. North Melbourne split its kick-ins between three players, with two of particular interest to KFC SuperCoaches – Jack Ziebell took five, Harry Sheezel three and Luke McDonald two. And as a team the Kangaroos had a 100 per cent play-on ratio. At Essendon Mason Redman took six kick-ins (playing on from five) and Jordan Ridley five (five) while St Kilda was the other interesting watch from round 1 as Jack Sinclair (four) shared kick-in duties with Nasiah Wanganeen-Milera (five) and Liam Stocker (one). Nick Daicos took two kick-ins for Collingwood but that number could have been a lot higher if Geelong had been more inaccurate in front of goal (16.7).

10. CAPTAINS CORNER

Backing the right (or wrong) captain had a huge impact on KFC SuperCoach scores in round 1, so the pressure is on to get it right this week. History provides some helpful pointers: Clayton Oliver averages 126 in his past five matches against Brisbane, Zach Merrett averages 126 in his past three against Gold Coast, Jack Steele averages 123 in his past three against the Bulldogs. Marcus Bontempelli has gone big in his past two against the Saints, scoring 181 and 159, James Sicily scored 113 and 164 in his past two against the Swans while Dockers ruckman Sean Darcy scored a monster 178 against the Kangaroos the last time they met. We can beat that, though. When Hawthorn and Sydney met in round 6 last year Callum Mills had 37 disposals, 11 marks and 214 KFC SuperCoach points. Want to try something really bold? Here are Nat Fyfe’s past six scores against North Melbourne: 125, 140, 147, 163, 126, 139.

Marcus Bontempelli could be in for a big game against the Saints. Picture: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images

11. DAICOS WARNING?

Coaches who were spooked by the prospect of a Nick Daicos tag would have watched in dismay as he ran amok on Friday night. With little defensive attention he racked up 21 kicks at 91 per cent efficiency and 129 KFC SuperCoach points. He might find the going harder against Port Adelaide on Saturday. Port Adelaide conceded 65 points per game to running defenders last season – the fewest of any team in the competition, and Power coaches are discussing how to put the clamps on the Magpie jet. On the flip side, St Kilda conceded the most points to that group of players in 2022 and after the Dockers backline racked it up against them in round 1 – Brennan Cox, Luke Ryan and Hayden Young took 46 marks between them – owners of Baily Dale (and Liam Jones, if he gets up from a neck injury) will be looking for redemption in round 2.

Originally published as SuperCoach Plus: 11 things you need to know for round 2 of the 2023 AFL season