AFL inuries down despite Footy Frenzy

Games lost to injury are down on last year following the Footy Frenzy many feared would ravage the AFL.

Hawthorn’s James Sicily suffered a season-ending knee injury on Sunday but, league-wide, games lost to injury are down so far this season compared to 2019

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 fewer games to injury to their best 22 players between rounds two and 12 compared with last year.

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.

Kayo is your ticket to the 2020 Toyota AFL Premiership Season. Watch every match of every round Live & On-Demand. New to Kayo? Get your 14-day free trial & start streaming instantly >

“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.

“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 total games lost to injury across each club indicate that between round two and round 12 — with round one removed to discount the COVID-19 shutdown — there have been 132 fewer games lost to injury to the best 22 players at each club.

This time last year saw a total of 940 games lost to injury to clubs’ best 22 players from rounds two to 12, which has dropped to 808.

The hub is any fitness boss’s 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 the slightly lower injury trend may not continue. “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.

“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. The Cats have used recovery methods like cryotherapy chambers, infra-red saunas and compression therapy.

Russell says flexibility is key.

“Every day is a challenging day, and you are 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.”

Herald Sun