One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

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Sid
Ricky Stuart
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One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

Post by Sid »

I think it’s an unreal stat that there has only been 1 Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics (QLD 2010).

Particularly taking into consideration this time period includes QLD’s dominant period of 8 series wins in a row, the longest series streak by either team.

I think it is an unbelievable stat. Statistically I would have thought the most common result would be a whitewash, given that one team would be better than the other in any given year, so should win 3 times out of 3 over a 6’ish week period. Even if both teams were evenly matched 50-50 every year, e.g. if you flipped a coin 60 times for match results across 3 game series, it’d be interesting to see how many times you’d have to do it to come up with 1 or fewer whitewash results.

As for home game advantage, I can see that being a big influence in a sport like a cricket game between England vs India, due to variables such as weather, pitch types, ground sizes, living comfort as these would be very contrasting factors.. but as for games held typically between Sydney and Brisbane (733km) within the same country, on the same sized field at the same time of night, I would think home ground advantage wouldn’t be so big?

Why do people think Origin series results have been so close for so long?

Will the current rules of V’landy Ball result in more whitewashes?
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gerg
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Re: One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

Post by gerg »

I haven't looked at any data but I think a clean sweep is very difficult with origin because the team looking to prevent the sweep has much more to play for in the 3rd game. The team going for the sweep probably spends the 10 days on the cans.

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Botman
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Re: One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

Post by Botman »

the margins are pretty thin. These are the best players in the world and even if they are outmatched slightly, they're almost always good enough and talented enough to win a game if they execute properly and get a break here and there... over the course of 3 games its reasonable to think even the over matched sides are going to strike the right levels of desperation, execution and a bit of luck to jag a game.

But the series are generally won by the team with the better spine, you can go through season to season and in almost every case, the team whose 1-6-7-9 were better won generally. The three exceptions to that in my mind are:

- Qld 1995: Brasher - Johns/Fitler - Johns - Serdaris vs O'Davis - Shearer/Smith - Lam - Bartrim
QLD won that 3-0 but it was a very strange time for RL, with all the SL players being ineligible and the game in turmoil with a lot of players not know what to do or where their future laid. But NSW had the better team and got whitewashed.

- NSW 2014: Hayne - Reynolds - Hodkinson - Farah vs Slater - Thurston - Cronk/DCE - Smith
QLD still at the peak of their powers and NSW really just reliant on Hayne mostly. And for two games that was good enough to scrap home. Literally just one freak footballer playing at an untouchable level. Very hard to repeat. I think you could play this series in a time loop another 20 times before you see NSW win the series again. The difference in talent reminds you of this current series.

- QLD 2020: Tedesco - Keary - Cleary - Cook vs Brimson/Holmes/Allen - Munster - DCE - Friend
This is probably closer than we give it credit for. Munster and DCE is are as good as Keary-Cleary but NSW definitely have the edge at the others spot. But again, we're a COVID season, the series was held at the end of the year with lock downs and all that jazz.

My point is all three clear outliers to me have mitigating circumstances that could go a fair way to explaining how those teams won in spite of inferior spines. But also fact they can, just goes to show when you get 34 of the best players in the world and they're playing proper competitive football, the margins are just too thin to expect many 3-0 results. At some point the other team get a break either with a bounce of the ball, or a key in game injury, or just better execution on the night and they're going to be talented enough to win even against a superior side when they get those breaks

And that feeds in to Gerg's point too, it's harder to motivate yourself to scrap for every inch when you're up 2-0 and you're already in party mode. If you're that little bit off at this level, you'll probably lose
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afgtnk
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Re: One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

Post by afgtnk »

The parochialism and partisan factor of home crowds would be a huge.

In the period you've mentioned, NSW have won 65% of their games at Stadium Australia. During the same time, they've only won 33% at Suncorp.
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Re: One Origin whitewash since the Sydney Olympics

Post by -PJ- »

And let’s not forget..in 2021..QLD stink.
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