Injury ladder: Where your club sits in games lost to best 22 players due to injury
While it was feared season 2020 could be the year of catastrophic injury numbers, Champion Data stats reveal injuries are actually down. But some clubs have been hit much harder than others. See the full injury ladder.
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Games lost to injury are down on last year following the Footy Frenzy many feared would ravage the game.
Champion Data statistics show that clubs have lost less games to injury to their best 22 players between Rounds 2 and 12 compared to 2019.
Leading club fitness boss Andrew Russell – who oversees Carlton’s program after 14 years and four premierships at Hawthorn – credits reduced game time combined with lower stress, good nutrition and better sleep in hub life as potential key factors.
“I think some teams have had a lot of injuries, and others not much at all,” Russell said.
“If they are down as an industry, what could possibly be the key factors? One is that it could be random and it has nothing to do with anything. Statistically, that’s sometimes how things go.
“But there’s a few things that I think are all important, and it’s hard to know which are more relevant than others.
“Game loads are down because of game time, so players are covering two to three less kilometres per game. That cumulative effect I think is significant in terms of fatigue. But what’s interesting is that for some players, even though the game time is lower, the intensity is just as high, if not higher.
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“Guys are recovering from games quicker, so apart from the frenzies, you’ve actually been able to train more in the past. Usually, every player is deconditioning over the course of the season … (and without a second-tier competition), players who aren’t playing can train a lot more and they all come in and are ready to go.”
Champion Data statistics which collate both games lost to injury to a team’s best 22 players and a total games lost to injury across each club indicate that between Round 2 and Round 12 – with Round 1 removed to discount the COVID shutdown – more than 130 less games have been lost to injury to the best 22 players at each club across the competition.
This time last year saw a total of 940 games lost to injury to clubs’ best 22 players from Rounds 2-12, which has dropped to 808.
The hub is any fitness boss’ dream scenario.
They’ve never had more control, and Russell said many players had responded physically and mentally, with lifestyle factors key.
“That’s underplayed, how important that is,” he explained.
“Quality nutrition, sleep, and stress – they’re the big blocks in terms of recovery.”
For many players — especially with their families in the hub — Russell said “life stress is as low as it’s ever been”, and they have dealt with the situation “extremely well”.
“We’ve never done the experiment before,” he said.
“But every meal, we feed them. They’ve never eaten better – especially teams that have had to quarantine, and we did twice. We had a month where 95 per cent of the things they ate, we’d planned for them. Even Uber Eats was shut down for those quarantining in Perth.
“They’re drinking less alcohol, they’ve got minimal outside stress and everything is controlled. And stress is a huge contributor to injury.”
The Footy Frenzy cost clubs on average 24 games to their best 22 through injury, when compared with statistics obtained by Champion Data prior to the compressed period.
And as the game prepares to reload for Frenzy 2.0 in coming weeks, Russell concedes that the slightly lower injury trend may not continue, admitting his reservation about a quick turnaround to 2021.
“We had five months to prepare them (for the season), then we had a six or eight weeks (shut down) where we tried to maintain where we were at, and then we topped them back up again, so it ended up working pretty well,” he said.
“But if you give them a big break and you have to come back and get them ready, it’s pretty risky to think we can have a really short preparation and think these guys are going to be ready to play.
“What we still don’t know is the cumulative effect of this year.
“We’ve still got a fair bit of footy to play. What it is now, it may continue on, but it may not.
“It may get to a point where physically and mentally they’ve just had enough. That is what we don’t know. We’re not sure how that looks.”
Geelong has visited Rigs Recovery, an elite performance recovery centre not far from its Gold Coast hub, which has been closing to the public as per AFL COVID-19 protocols.
Cats have used recovery methods like cryotherapy chambers, infra-red saunas and compression therapy in a bid to counter short turnarounds in games.
If there’s one thing Russell has learned in footy – this year or otherwise – it’s to be flexible.
“Every day is a challenging day, and you working your way through whatever comes your way,” he said.
“You have patches that are really challenging and others that go smoothly. You’re looking to get as many smooth patches, but there’s no club that does it easy. No one’s doing it easy.”
INJURY LADDER
Total games lost to injury from Rounds 2-12, 2020
INJURY LADDER
Total games lost to injury from Rounds 2-12, 2019
All stats: CHAMPION DATA
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