Squiggle 2017

INFO

What Squiggles are • How to play through a season • Prediction • FAQ • The Model • Flagpole

What Squiggles are

Squiggles are visualizations of AFL team performances, charting attack and defence over the course of a season.

Teams ⇡ high on the chart kick big scores. Teams on the ⇢ right keep their opposition to low scores. Teams in the ↗ upper-right do both. Teams in the ↙ lower-left do neither.

Squiggles are generated from only two inputs: the final scores and venue of each match. The mathematical model is very simple, so that squiggles can be a useful tool, not a mysterious black box that you need to trust knows more about football than you do.

Squiggles are handy because:

They visualize different game styles. Ross Lyon teams, for example, lurk on the right side of squiggles, about halfway up, since they keep their opposition to low scores but don't score highly themselves.
They provide interesting season replays, showing how teams slumped or soared at different times of the year.
They aren't affected by fixture bias, since they consider the quality of opposition (and, for interstate games, the difficulty of playing away).
They give tips.
They predict the season.

The predictive model is roughly as accurate as tipping the favourite every game. (Which is hard to beat!) Over a season, an informed, observant human should beat it, but not by much. It will beat an average human tipper. You can review its accuracy by visiting the TIPS section of any year, but the last five years it has been 78% (2011), 78% (2012), 72% (2013), 72% (2014), 74% (2015), and 69% (2016).

How to play through a season

To watch the evolution of a past season, use the top controls:

Rewind to the start of the season

Previous Round

Next Round

Reload

You can also:

Click a team name in the legend at the top to hide/show it.
Click a team flag to remove every other team.

For example, you might like to rewind, click Hawthorn's flag to remove all other teams, click Geelong's name in the legend to add it back in, then repeatedly step through the season to watch their dance of death.

Things work faster with fewer teams. If the chart is sluggish, try removing some!

To zoom in on an area, drag a box around it.

Prediction

Weekly Tips

Click TIPS at the top of the page. These update at noon on Tuesdays. The predicted scorelines are what the squiggle expects. The more the actual scoreline differs from this, the more teams will move.

Season Predictor

This is how the ladder will look if the squiggle has correctly rated every team and nobody gets better or worse.

For the home & away season, it uses a probabilistic ladder, not a simple tally of tips. Both teams are awarded a win probability from each game, so that if the squiggle thinks Hawthorn is 68% likely to beat Collingwood, it will award the Hawks 0.68 wins and the Pies 0.32 wins, increasing both team's tally of "probable wins" by less than 1.

This is because if a team plays 10 games with 60% likelihood of winning each game, we should expect them to win about 6/10—not, as we would get if we tipped each game and tallied up the tips, 10/10. We know that upsets will happen; we just don't know when. A probabilitistic ladder accounts for the likelihood that teams will sometimes unexpectedly win or lose, even though we doesn't know when.

This can look like a bug in the predictor, if you see a team tipped to win a match that doesn't seem to be credited. For example, a team might be on "15 (14.7)" wins, which means 14.7 "probable wins" rounded off to 15. (Rounding occurs so that teams can be secondarily ranked by their percentage.) And then that team is tipped to win the following week, but it remains on 15 wins, now "15 (15.3)". What has happened is the number of probable wins hasn't risen by enough to be rounded to a higher number. It has earned 0.6 more probable wins, but this still rounds off to 15. The predictor is saying it's still most likely this team will be on 15 wins, after accounting for the likelihood that some of its tips will be wrong.

Finals matches are predicted using simple tips. However, this isn't a very reliable way of doing it, and not the squiggle's official Premier tip. For this, please see Flagpole.

Starting the season: Team starting positions are heavily influenced by their late-season performances the previous year, and the off-season is completely ignored. There is no adjustment made for recovery from injuries, or players gained or lost via the draft or trade table, or anything else. For example, Collingwood started 2015 rated very low due to their injury-plagued end to 2014, while Adelaide and West Coast started in good positions after solid late-2014 performances.

Interactive Season Predictor

Drag teams around the chart and make the squiggle predict the rest of the season based on the new positions! It's the best of both worlds: your footy insight plus the squiggle's ability to sensibly model a season.

Reposition teams to your heart's content, open up the Predictor and click RECALCULATE.

This also provides a shareable link to the generated squiggle, so you can show off your work to other people.

FAQ

What causes a team to move?

Teams move when they do better or worse than the squiggle expected.

For each match, the squiggle predicts a scoreline, given their current position and the venue at which the game will be played. If this turns out to be exactly right, the teams will remain where they are, since this means the squiggle has them positioned right. If, however, the scoreline is different, the teams will move. A team that scores more points than the squiggle expected will move ⇡ up; a team that scored fewer will move ⇣ down; a team that held its opposition to a lower score will move ⇢ right; and a team that allowed its opposition to score more will move ⇠ left.

Usually two of these things happen at once! A team will score either more or less than predicted, as well as allowing their opposition to score either more or less than predicted. So they will move on a diagonal:

↗ Scored more than predicted, held opponent to less than predicted

↘ Scored less than predicted, held opponent to less than predicted

↙ Scored less than predicted, opponent scored more than predicted

↖ Scored more than predicted, opponent scored more than predicted

How far a team moves depends on how different the result was from the squiggle's prediction. If the result was close to expectation, a team may barely budge. But an unexpected thrashing will cause a lot of movement.

Do teams get more movement against easy opposition?

No, because the squiggle expects better performances against weaker opponents, and to move to a better position, the team has to beat this expectation.

For the same reason, the squiggle isn't affected by fixture bias.

Can a team lose and still move into a better squiggle position?

Yes! The squiggle believes in honourable losses and shameful victories. If a team is expected to win by 10 goals but only prevails by 5, it will slide.

How is home ground advantage determined?

As described in the Model section, home ground advantage is only used in games between interstate opponents. Most of the time, this is pretty clear. But there are some quirks and gray areas.

The squiggle believes in nominal home ground advantage. That is, if there is a game between interstate opponents, it doesn't matter where that game is actually being played: the squiggle will deem the nominal home team to possess home ground advantage. For example, if St. Kilda play Sydney in New Zealand, the Saints are still given the advantage.
The reason for this is simply that this has proven the case more often than not in the past.
Geelong is considered to be its own state. That is, home ground advantage is considered in games between the Cats and everybody else.

Why doesn't the squiggle consider more factors?

I haven't seen enough evidence that it makes a difference, i.e. significantly improves tipping accuracy.
I want to keep the model as simple as possible, so squiggles can be a tool that enhances your ability to understand football, rather than an algorithm that replaces your own insight.

If you want a full-on predictor, there is some great stuff at Matter of Stats, Footy Maths Institute and Footy Forecaster.

What are the squiggle's weaknesses?

Possible flaws, which you may decide to compensate for, include:

The squiggle doesn't consider a team's level of motivation, which seems to be fairly significant. The squiggle assumes all teams are trying equally hard at all times.
The squiggle doesn't consider injuries or suspensions. It actually seems to me that people tend to over-estimate the impact of injuries, especially to key players. But clearly it's a bad thing for a team to lose a star player, and the squiggle doesn't take this into account at all. It rates teams, not players.
The squiggle doesn't consider the impact of weather. It may reward a team for having a good defence when in reality what was making it hard to score was torrential rain. This doesn't seem to happen often enough to throw anything too far out, but does occur from time to time.
The squiggle doesn't place any special value on wins. That is, it doesn't see much difference between a 1-point victory and a 1-point loss. It may thus underestimate a team that does "just enough," or is especially good at holding on in tight contests. Likewise, it may overestimate a team that regularly gets itself into winning positions against good teams but lacks the ability to close the games out.
The squiggle gets very excited about very low-scoring games. Whether this is a flaw is arguable, since the model does seem to work. But the squiggle's maths mean that if a team is expected to keep its opposition to 80 points, and it actually keeps them to 40, this is considered twice as good, while keeping them to 20 points is considered four times as good, and keeping them to 10 points is eight times as good. Those are some big multipliers: to be 8 times better than a predicted 80 points in terms of Attack, a team would need to score 640 points (80 x 8), which is a lot more than the all-time AFL record. This means it's significantly easier for a team to move rapidly rightwards on a squiggle than upwards.
The underlying model generates some mild inflation over the course of a season, which causes the squiggle to rate teams about 5-10% higher by the end of the year compared to the start.
The default algorithm doesn't change for the first three weeks of finals, despite some evidence that other models tip better there, although it is different for the Grand Final, since Grand Finals really are different. Grand Finals are tipped using the Flagpole algorithm.

Why does the model use those values?

All the numbers used by the squiggle are that way because they worked best (i.e. made the most accurate predictions) when every possible combination was tested with a simulator replaying the last few decades.

How are the year's starting values calculated?

2015 starting positions are very similar to their end 2014 positions—the only difference is that 2013 data is no longer considered, so teams are modeled from the start of 2014 with each beginning on 50 ATTACK and 50 DEFENCE.

This means late-season 2014 results weigh quite heavily. For example, Collingwood had an injury-plagued end to 2014, and so is rated very low. Adelaide and West Coast, by contrast, finished the year with several solid performances, and so begin the year higher than you might expect.

What's with those crazy charts for the 1900s!?

Football scores were a lot lower a century ago, especially in the very early years, when single-digit scorelines abounded. The squiggle is calibrated for modern football, and thinks a game in which one team is held to a single goal (or no goals!) signifies an unbelievably good defensive effort. This causes teams to go shooting off to the right quite often in charts from the 1890s, 1900s and 1910s. So it's not a particularly good visualization of the strength of any particular team in that era. But it is interesting in terms of how different the whole league looks: how low and flat it is compared to today.

Similary, it can be interesting to look at where the mass of teams tends to sit in different decades; for example, how attacking the late 1980s was, with plenty of teams sitting high & centre/left compared to today.

The Model (ISTATE-91:12)

In the beginning, each team is assigned an arbitrary starting value of 50 ATTACK and 50 DEFENCE.

Scores are predicted for a match:

PREDICTED SCORE = 85 * (TEAM ATTACK ÷ OPPOSITION DEFENCE) + HOME ADVANTAGE

For example, in a match at a neutral venue between a team with ATTACK 56 and an opposition with DEFENCE 50, the team is predicted to score: 85 * (56 ÷ 50) + 0 = 95 points.

HOME ADVANTAGE is 6 when a team plays an interstate side at home, -6 when it plays an interstate side away, otherwise 0.

Predicted scores are compared to the actual scores, and ATTACK and DEFENCE adjusted accordingly. For example, if a team scored more highly than predicted, its ATTACK score needs to be increased, since the Squiggle underrated it. Likewise, the opposition's DEFENCE score should decrease, since they failed to restrict the team as well as predicted. This is done by calculating what these scores would have to have been to predict the result perfectly, then constructing a weighted average of this along with all other results for the year, in which the most recent round comprises 9% of the final value.

At the start of a season, team starting points are calculated by doing the above for the previous season. For example, to calculate starting points for 2014, each team is assigned 50 to ATTACK and DEFENCE, then the 2013 season is played through.

The constants in this model (weighting the most recent round at 9%, considering 85 points a "typical" score, awarding a 12-point relative advantage to home sides playing interstate sides, and using exactly one previous season's results as a starting point each year) were chosen simply by simulating all possible values and seeing which produced the most accurate predictions over the course of the last 20 seasons or so.

The axis units are completely arbitrary, and entirely due to the choice of 50 as a starting value for each team's ATTACK and DEFENCE. They have no meaning except when comparing teams to each other.

When determining "probable wins" in the Season Predictor, an algorithm is used that reflects the actual accuracy of Squiggle tips vs real-life results. Three factors affect the likelihood of a tip being correct:

Margin: The greater the predicted margin, the more likely the tip is to be correct.
Round Number: Games that occur later in the season are a little more likely to be tipped correctly.
Weeks Until Game: Games that are weeks or months in the future are a little less likely to be tipped correctly.

Flagpole

Flagpole is tuned to predict premiers. In particular, it's good at:

Rating the eventual premier highly throughout the year
Picking the winner of the Grand Final

It's similar to eyeballing how close teams are to the ideal cluster of premiership cups on the squiggle chart.

Record

Flagpole has a 15-5 record (75%) at picking Grand Final winners over the last 20 years (1997-2016). The years it got wrong are 1997, 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016.

On average, it has rated the eventual premier within 1.55 rungs of top spot through the season. This is equivalent to rating the eventual premier 4th for half the season and 1st for the other half.

Why Flagpole?

If you eyeball the squiggle chart, you can see that premiership cups aren't evenly distributed: there are more in the attacking area of the chart. So there's a slight difference between how likely a team is to win any random match (which is what the regular squiggle does), and how likely they are to win the flag. To predict the premier, we need to account for this.

Also, tipping finals one game at a time, like the Season Predictor does, is very dependent on knife-edge results, so that small changes can lead to very different precitions. Flagpole is more stable, has better historical accuracy, and is more consistent with what you see on the chart, i.e. that a team surrounded by premiership cups is in a better place than a very defensive one out on its own.

What Flagpole Rates

Compared to the regular squiggle algorithm:

It ignores home ground advantage, looking only at final scores.
It rates attack more highly.
It is more sensitive to late-season results
It is more sensitive to good results than bad ones—that is, it rates erratic teams that can unexpectedly kick big scores more highly than consistent ones that never do.

Why Flagpole Rates That Stuff

Because that's what premiers have done over the last twenty years. Explosive attack specialists such as Hawthorn and Geelong have won plenty of flags; defence merchants like Fremantle and St. Kilda have not.

Defensive teams have won premierships, of course, but far less frequently, even after accounting for how many of them there are. For example, in 2015, the Final Eight had five teams that were either balanced or attack specialists, and three defence-heavy teams in Fremantle (1st), Sydney (4th), and Richmond (5th). Those three lost every single game except when they played each other.

Flaws

Flagpole ignores the path a team must take to the flag. It ignores the difficulty of the games it must win, whether the team gets to play finals at home or away, how many interstate trips are required, whether it has a week off, and even how likely it is to make finals at all.

This can look pretty strange, e.g. it may rank a team 5th when it is going to miss finals. This will happen if a team displays the kind of form that would give it a decent shot at the flag if only it did make finals (such as a team making a run late in the year). For this reason, Flagpole can be occasionally definitely wrong about some mid-ranked teams compared to others, by ranking a team that won't make finals higher than one that will.

I haven't attempted to adjust for this because we don't have enough objective data on how beneficial it is to play finals at home, or travel less, or have a week off, or anything else. So Flagpole is purely a form rating.

Design

Like all my squiggle stuff, this came about by leaving the computer alone to brute-force hundreds of thousands of combinations of variables, algorithms, and filters, and coming back later to see what did well. The advantage of this method is that I don't need to be smart enough to design clever algorithms; I just find them. In fact, usually I don't even know why they work at first; I have to figure that out afterwards.

The disadvantage is it's easy to find algorithms that work well from pure chance, which fit the historical data well but don't actually have any predictive or descriptive power. To reduce the risk of this, I prefer simple algorithms with very few inputs (often only scorelines), and I use as much data as possible, like 20 years worth of results. But that still isn't much data when it comes to finals and Grand Finals.

How To Make Your Own Flagpole

Flagpole is an algorithm named OFFDEF4G-95:79.

Assign every team an ATTACK score of 50 and a DEFENCE score of 50
Look up the results of the first game of last year
Predict scores using the formula: TEAM A PREDICTED SCORE = 79 * TEAM A ATTACK / TEAM B DEFENCE
Compare predicted scores to actual scores by using the same relationship described above, so that TEAM A HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK = TEAM A ACTUAL SCORE * TEAM B DEFENCE / 79 and TEAM A HYPOTHETICAL DEFENCE = 79 * TEAM A ATTACK / TEAM B ACTUAL SCORE.
Here is the unique thing about OFFDEF4: square and double the HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK score. That is: NEW HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK = HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK * HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK * 2.
Assign new ATTACK and DEFENCE scores to each team, where 95% of the new score is the old score and 5% is the new score. That is: TEAM A NEW ATTACK = (0.95 * TEAM A OLD ATTACK) + (0.05 * TEAM A NEW HYPOTHETICAL ATTACK). Ditto for DEFENCE.
Repeat steps #2-#6 for every game.

That's it! Just one other thing: because this algorithm generates a lot of inflation over a season (which is good, I believe, because it means more more weighting for finals performances), its tips are only good as margins. If you want it to predict absolute scores, you need to increasingly scale back its predicted numbers, or else you get Grand Final tips where both teams are tipped to score well over 100.

2017 ROUND 28 TIPS

Algorithm: ISTATE-91:12
Tips after Round 27: 127

History...

In 2017, algorithm ISTATE-91:12 correctly tipped 127 games at an accuracy of 61.35%.

Draws are counted as correct tips.

Round 1

Carlton (89) lost to Richmond (132) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 43) Richmond by 1
Collingwood (86) lost to Western Bulldogs (100) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 14) Western Bulldogs by 21
St Kilda (90) lost to Melbourne (120) at Docklands (VIC) [Melbourne by 30) St Kilda by 2
Sydney (82) lost to Port Adelaide (110) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Port Adelaide by 28) Sydney by 43
Essendon (116) defeated Hawthorn (91) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Essendon by 25) Hawthorn by 51
Gold Coast (96) lost to Brisbane Lions (98) at Carrara (QLD) [Brisbane Lions by 2) Gold Coast by 22
North Melbourne (93) lost to West Coast (136) at Docklands (VIC) [West Coast by 43) West Coast by 0
Adelaide (147) defeated Greater Western Sydney (91) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 56) Adelaide by 3
Fremantle (73) lost to Geelong (115) at Subiaco (WA) [Geelong by 42) Geelong by 29

Round 2

Richmond (99) defeated Collingwood (80) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 19) Collingwood by 20
Western Bulldogs (110) defeated Sydney (87) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 23) Western Bulldogs by 8
Hawthorn (89) lost to Adelaide (113) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Adelaide by 24) Adelaide by 9
Greater Western Sydney (160) defeated Gold Coast (58) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 102) Greater Western Sydney by 65
Brisbane Lions (84) lost to Essendon (111) at Gabba (QLD) [Essendon by 27) Essendon by 2
West Coast (116) defeated St Kilda (97) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 19) West Coast by 34
Geelong (112) defeated North Melbourne (111) at Docklands (VIC) [Geelong by 1) Geelong by 36
Melbourne (86) defeated Carlton (64) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 22) Melbourne by 19
Port Adelaide (145) defeated Fremantle (56) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 89) Port Adelaide by 45

Round 3

Sydney (79) lost to Collingwood (80) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Collingwood by 1) Sydney by 39
North Melbourne (67) lost to Greater Western Sydney (109) at Bellerive Oval (TAS) [Greater Western Sydney by 42) Greater Western Sydney by 19
Richmond (76) defeated West Coast (65) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 11) West Coast by 15
Geelong (126) defeated Melbourne (97) at Docklands (VIC) [Geelong by 29) Geelong by 33
Fremantle (89) defeated Western Bulldogs (73) at Subiaco (WA) [Fremantle by 16) Western Bulldogs by 39
Port Adelaide (83) lost to Adelaide (100) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 17) Adelaide by 18
St Kilda (107) defeated Brisbane Lions (76) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 31) St Kilda by 59
Carlton (57) defeated Essendon (42) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Carlton by 15) Carlton by 3
Gold Coast (139) defeated Hawthorn (53) at Carrara (QLD) [Gold Coast by 86) Hawthorn by 24

Round 4

West Coast (91) defeated Sydney (65) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 26) Sydney by 0
North Melbourne (86) lost to Western Bulldogs (89) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 3) Western Bulldogs by 23
Melbourne (104) lost to Fremantle (106) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Fremantle by 2) Melbourne by 33
Greater Western Sydney (112) defeated Port Adelaide (81) at Manuka Oval (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 31) Greater Western Sydney by 33
Carlton (82) lost to Gold Coast (108) at Docklands (VIC) [Gold Coast by 26) Carlton by 7
Adelaide (153) defeated Essendon (88) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 65) Adelaide by 72
Collingwood (55) lost to St Kilda (69) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 14) Collingwood by 11
Brisbane Lions (67) lost to Richmond (119) at Gabba (QLD) [Richmond by 52) Richmond by 23
Hawthorn (48) lost to Geelong (134) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Geelong by 86) Geelong by 8

Round 5

Port Adelaide (137) defeated Carlton (47) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 90) Port Adelaide by 44
Western Bulldogs (122) defeated Brisbane Lions (90) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 32) Western Bulldogs by 83
Gold Coast (86) lost to Adelaide (153) at Carrara (QLD) [Adelaide by 67) Adelaide by 33
Sydney (63) lost to Greater Western Sydney (105) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 42) Greater Western Sydney by 9
Fremantle (67) defeated North Melbourne (62) at Subiaco (WA) [Fremantle by 5) North Melbourne by 8
St Kilda (88) lost to Geelong (126) at Docklands (VIC) [Geelong by 38) Geelong by 18
Hawthorn (125) defeated West Coast (75) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Hawthorn by 50) West Coast by 9
Richmond (88) defeated Melbourne (75) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 13) Melbourne by 3
Essendon (100) defeated Collingwood (82) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Essendon by 18) Collingwood by 28

Round 6

Greater Western Sydney (75) defeated Western Bulldogs (73) at Manuka Oval (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 2) Greater Western Sydney by 31
Hawthorn (55) lost to St Kilda (130) at York Park (TAS) [St Kilda by 75) Hawthorn by 2
Carlton (97) defeated Sydney (78) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Carlton by 19) Sydney by 28
Brisbane Lions (67) lost to Port Adelaide (150) at Gabba (QLD) [Port Adelaide by 83) Port Adelaide by 55
North Melbourne (107) defeated Gold Coast (94) at Docklands (VIC) [North Melbourne by 13) North Melbourne by 26
West Coast (103) defeated Fremantle (62) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 41) West Coast by 27
Essendon (74) lost to Melbourne (112) at Docklands (VIC) [Melbourne by 38) Melbourne by 16
Geelong (78) lost to Collingwood (107) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Collingwood by 29) Geelong by 43
Adelaide (140) defeated Richmond (64) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 76) Adelaide by 50

Round 7

St Kilda (108) defeated Greater Western Sydney (85) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 23) Greater Western Sydney by 15
North Melbourne (145) defeated Adelaide (86) at Bellerive Oval (TAS) [North Melbourne by 59) Adelaide by 25
Collingwood (56) lost to Carlton (79) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Carlton by 23) Collingwood by 25
Port Adelaide (87) lost to West Coast (97) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [West Coast by 10) Port Adelaide by 19
Western Bulldogs (80) defeated Richmond (75) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 5) Western Bulldogs by 24
Gold Coast (124) defeated Geelong (99) at Carrara (QLD) [Gold Coast by 25) Geelong by 27
Sydney (135) defeated Brisbane Lions (81) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 54) Sydney by 76
Melbourne (91) lost to Hawthorn (94) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Hawthorn by 3) Melbourne by 3
Fremantle (116) defeated Essendon (79) at Subiaco (WA) [Fremantle by 37) Fremantle by 15

Round 8

West Coast (69) defeated Western Bulldogs (61) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 8) West Coast by 10
Hawthorn (113) defeated Brisbane Lions (75) at York Park (TAS) [Hawthorn by 38) Hawthorn by 52
St Kilda (85) defeated Carlton (66) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 19) St Kilda by 22
Greater Western Sydney (102) defeated Collingwood (99) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 3) Greater Western Sydney by 39
Essendon (110) defeated Geelong (93) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Essendon by 17) Geelong by 36
Adelaide (66) lost to Melbourne (107) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Melbourne by 41) Adelaide by 47
Richmond (70) lost to Fremantle (72) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Fremantle by 2) Richmond by 23
Gold Coast (38) lost to Port Adelaide (110) at Jiangwan Stadium (CHI) [Port Adelaide by 72) Port Adelaide by 14
North Melbourne (78) lost to Sydney (120) at Docklands (VIC) [Sydney by 42) North Melbourne by 5

Round 9

Geelong (104) defeated Western Bulldogs (81) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 23) Geelong by 11
St Kilda (68) lost to Sydney (118) at Docklands (VIC) [Sydney by 50) St Kilda by 4
Greater Western Sydney (78) defeated Richmond (75) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 3) Greater Western Sydney by 46
Brisbane Lions (60) lost to Adelaide (140) at Gabba (QLD) [Adelaide by 80) Adelaide by 65
Collingwood (90) defeated Hawthorn (72) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Collingwood by 18) Collingwood by 13
Essendon (125) defeated West Coast (64) at Docklands (VIC) [Essendon by 61) West Coast by 22
Melbourne (90) lost to North Melbourne (104) at M.C.G. (VIC) [North Melbourne by 14) Melbourne by 3
Fremantle (86) defeated Carlton (51) at Subiaco (WA) [Fremantle by 35) Fremantle by 12

Round 10

Geelong (81) defeated Port Adelaide (79) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 2) Geelong by 2
Sydney (75) lost to Hawthorn (81) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Hawthorn by 6) Sydney by 42
Western Bulldogs (90) defeated St Kilda (50) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 40) Western Bulldogs by 11
Melbourne (122) defeated Gold Coast (87) at Traeger Park (NT) [Melbourne by 35) Melbourne by 30
Richmond (81) defeated Essendon (66) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 15) Richmond by 7
Adelaide (143) defeated Fremantle (43) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 100) Adelaide by 48
Collingwood (129) defeated Brisbane Lions (84) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Collingwood by 45) Collingwood by 65
Carlton (96) lost to North Melbourne (113) at Docklands (VIC) [North Melbourne by 17) North Melbourne by 20
West Coast (90) lost to Greater Western Sydney (98) at Subiaco (WA) [Greater Western Sydney by 8) Greater Western Sydney by 3

Round 11

Port Adelaide (98) defeated Hawthorn (47) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 51) Port Adelaide by 41
Geelong (96) defeated Adelaide (74) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 22) Geelong by 0
Gold Coast (80) defeated West Coast (77) at Carrara (QLD) [Gold Coast by 3) West Coast by 10
Greater Western Sydney (117) defeated Essendon (101) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 16) Greater Western Sydney by 49
North Melbourne (66) lost to Richmond (101) at Docklands (VIC) [Richmond by 35) North Melbourne by 6
Fremantle (85) lost to Collingwood (105) at Subiaco (WA) [Collingwood by 20) Collingwood by 8

Round 12

Sydney (88) defeated Western Bulldogs (42) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 46) Sydney by 10
Adelaide (111) defeated St Kilda (54) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 57) Adelaide by 39
Hawthorn (79) lost to Gold Coast (95) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Gold Coast by 16) Hawthorn by 21
Brisbane Lions (121) defeated Fremantle (64) at Gabba (QLD) [Brisbane Lions by 57) Fremantle by 12
Essendon (131) defeated Port Adelaide (61) at Docklands (VIC) [Essendon by 70) Port Adelaide by 25
Carlton (71) defeated Greater Western Sydney (70) at Docklands (VIC) [Carlton by 1) Greater Western Sydney by 23
Melbourne (104) defeated Collingwood (100) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 4) Collingwood by 1

Round 13

West Coast (83) defeated Geelong (70) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 13) Geelong by 1
North Melbourne (72) lost to St Kilda (89) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 17) North Melbourne by 0
Richmond (71) lost to Sydney (80) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Sydney by 9) Sydney by 8
Port Adelaide (121) defeated Brisbane Lions (81) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 40) Port Adelaide by 72
Gold Coast (73) lost to Carlton (83) at Carrara (QLD) [Carlton by 10) Gold Coast by 17
Western Bulldogs (56) lost to Melbourne (113) at Docklands (VIC) [Melbourne by 57) Western Bulldogs by 11

Round 14

Adelaide (82) lost to Hawthorn (96) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Hawthorn by 14) Adelaide by 50
Sydney (86) defeated Essendon (85) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 1) Sydney by 34
Collingwood (62) lost to Port Adelaide (93) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Port Adelaide by 31) Port Adelaide by 3
Brisbane Lions (86) lost to Greater Western Sydney (146) at Gabba (QLD) [Greater Western Sydney by 60) Greater Western Sydney by 44
Western Bulldogs (107) defeated North Melbourne (106) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 1) Western Bulldogs by 12
West Coast (96) lost to Melbourne (99) at Subiaco (WA) [Melbourne by 3) West Coast by 8
Geelong (74) defeated Fremantle (72) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 2) Geelong by 51
Richmond (84) defeated Carlton (58) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 26) Richmond by 10
St Kilda (103) defeated Gold Coast (72) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 31) St Kilda by 25

Round 15

Melbourne (50) lost to Sydney (85) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Sydney by 35) Melbourne by 5
Western Bulldogs (80) lost to West Coast (87) at Docklands (VIC) [West Coast by 7) Western Bulldogs by 15
Carlton (77) lost to Adelaide (89) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Adelaide by 12) Adelaide by 23
Gold Coast (118) defeated North Melbourne (99) at Carrara (QLD) [Gold Coast by 19) North Melbourne by 1
Greater Western Sydney (68) drew with Geelong (68) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [DRAW by 0) Greater Western Sydney by 17
Port Adelaide (63) lost to Richmond (76) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Richmond by 13) Port Adelaide by 30
Essendon (82) lost to Brisbane Lions (90) at Docklands (VIC) [Brisbane Lions by 8) Essendon by 55
Hawthorn (118) defeated Collingwood (94) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Hawthorn by 24) Collingwood by 3
Fremantle (80) lost to St Kilda (89) at Subiaco (WA) [St Kilda by 9) St Kilda by 5

Round 16

Adelaide (104) defeated Western Bulldogs (45) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 59) Adelaide by 26
Hawthorn (97) drew with Greater Western Sydney (97) at York Park (TAS) [DRAW by 0) Greater Western Sydney by 4
Collingwood (80) lost to Essendon (117) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Essendon by 37) Essendon by 1
Sydney (118) defeated Gold Coast (51) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 67) Sydney by 48
Brisbane Lions (78) lost to Geelong (163) at Gabba (QLD) [Geelong by 85) Geelong by 33
St Kilda (138) defeated Richmond (71) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 67) Richmond by 6
North Melbourne (82) lost to Fremantle (86) at Docklands (VIC) [Fremantle by 4) North Melbourne by 28
Carlton (82) lost to Melbourne (90) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 8) Melbourne by 19
West Coast (88) lost to Port Adelaide (120) at Subiaco (WA) [Port Adelaide by 32) West Coast by 3

Round 17

St Kilda (57) lost to Essendon (118) at Docklands (VIC) [Essendon by 61) St Kilda by 6
Geelong (88) defeated Hawthorn (85) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Geelong by 3) Geelong by 30
Port Adelaide (127) defeated North Melbourne (57) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 70) Port Adelaide by 40
Gold Coast (88) lost to Collingwood (103) at Carrara (QLD) [Collingwood by 15) Gold Coast by 1
Greater Western Sydney (83) lost to Sydney (96) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Sydney by 13) Sydney by 11
Melbourne (70) lost to Adelaide (116) at Marrara Oval (NT) [Adelaide by 46) Adelaide by 8
Richmond (112) defeated Brisbane Lions (81) at Docklands (VIC) [Richmond by 31) Richmond by 44
Carlton (62) lost to Western Bulldogs (82) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 20) Western Bulldogs by 13
Fremantle (44) lost to West Coast (74) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 30) West Coast by 20

Round 18

Adelaide (91) defeated Geelong (70) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 21) Adelaide by 25
Essendon (132) defeated North Melbourne (105) at Docklands (VIC) [Essendon by 27) Essendon by 21
Melbourne (88) defeated Port Adelaide (65) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 23) Port Adelaide by 8
Western Bulldogs (110) defeated Gold Coast (56) at Cazaly's Stadium (QLD) [Western Bulldogs by 54) Western Bulldogs by 31
Sydney (101) defeated St Kilda (59) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 42) Sydney by 35
Fremantle (48) lost to Hawthorn (100) at Subiaco (WA) [Hawthorn by 52) Hawthorn by 6
Richmond (64) defeated Greater Western Sydney (45) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 19) Greater Western Sydney by 2
Collingwood (93) defeated West Coast (85) at Docklands (VIC) [Collingwood by 8) Collingwood by 0
Brisbane Lions (112) defeated Carlton (82) at Gabba (QLD) [Brisbane Lions by 30) Carlton by 2

Round 19

Hawthorn (72) defeated Sydney (66) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Hawthorn by 6) Sydney by 5
North Melbourne (76) defeated Melbourne (72) at Bellerive Oval (TAS) [North Melbourne by 4) Melbourne by 17
Greater Western Sydney (98) defeated Fremantle (86) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 12) Greater Western Sydney by 44
Port Adelaide (63) defeated St Kilda (61) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 2) Port Adelaide by 30
Carlton (58) lost to Geelong (123) at Docklands (VIC) [Geelong by 65) Geelong by 17
Gold Coast (65) lost to Richmond (98) at Carrara (QLD) [Richmond by 33) Richmond by 8
Western Bulldogs (127) defeated Essendon (97) at Docklands (VIC) [Western Bulldogs by 30) Essendon by 3
Collingwood (103) drew with Adelaide (103) at M.C.G. (VIC) [DRAW by 0) Adelaide by 21
West Coast (113) defeated Brisbane Lions (45) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 68) West Coast by 48

Round 20

Geelong (61) lost to Sydney (107) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Sydney by 46) Geelong by 6
Greater Western Sydney (97) defeated Melbourne (62) at Manuka Oval (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 35) Greater Western Sydney by 18
Essendon (84) defeated Carlton (76) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Essendon by 8) Essendon by 27
Brisbane Lions (89) lost to Western Bulldogs (103) at Gabba (QLD) [Western Bulldogs by 14) Western Bulldogs by 27
North Melbourne (57) lost to Collingwood (111) at Docklands (VIC) [Collingwood by 54) Collingwood by 7
Fremantle (90) defeated Gold Coast (67) at Subiaco (WA) [Fremantle by 23) Fremantle by 14
St Kilda (103) defeated West Coast (95) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 8) St Kilda by 6
Richmond (93) defeated Hawthorn (64) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 29) Hawthorn by 3
Adelaide (130) defeated Port Adelaide (46) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 84) Adelaide by 8

Round 21

Western Bulldogs (57) lost to Greater Western Sydney (105) at Docklands (VIC) [Greater Western Sydney by 48) Western Bulldogs by 7
Sydney (143) defeated Fremantle (39) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 104) Sydney by 54
Geelong (80) defeated Richmond (66) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 14) Geelong by 17
Brisbane Lions (142) defeated Gold Coast (84) at Gabba (QLD) [Brisbane Lions by 58) Gold Coast by 5
Essendon (80) lost to Adelaide (123) at Docklands (VIC) [Adelaide by 43) Adelaide by 20
West Coast (100) defeated Carlton (83) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 17) West Coast by 38
Melbourne (96) defeated St Kilda (72) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 24) St Kilda by 2
Hawthorn (116) defeated North Melbourne (89) at York Park (TAS) [Hawthorn by 27) Hawthorn by 18
Port Adelaide (98) defeated Collingwood (71) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 27) Port Adelaide by 19

Round 22

Adelaide (80) lost to Sydney (83) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Sydney by 3) Adelaide by 12
Western Bulldogs (79) lost to Port Adelaide (96) at Eureka Stadium (VIC) [Port Adelaide by 17) Western Bulldogs by 4
Collingwood (59) lost to Geelong (70) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Geelong by 11) Collingwood by 0
Greater Western Sydney (81) defeated West Coast (60) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 21) Greater Western Sydney by 22
Carlton (77) defeated Hawthorn (70) at Docklands (VIC) [Carlton by 7) Hawthorn by 21
Gold Coast (57) lost to Essendon (90) at Carrara (QLD) [Essendon by 33) Essendon by 21
Melbourne (104) defeated Brisbane Lions (91) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Melbourne by 13) Melbourne by 42
St Kilda (127) defeated North Melbourne (78) at Docklands (VIC) [St Kilda by 49) St Kilda by 15
Fremantle (51) lost to Richmond (155) at Subiaco (WA) [Richmond by 104) Richmond by 14

Round 23

Hawthorn (99) defeated Western Bulldogs (90) at Docklands (VIC) [Hawthorn by 9) Hawthorn by 3
Collingwood (99) defeated Melbourne (83) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Collingwood by 16) Melbourne by 0
Brisbane Lions (79) lost to North Melbourne (130) at Gabba (QLD) [North Melbourne by 51) Brisbane Lions by 6
Sydney (138) defeated Carlton (57) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 81) Sydney by 56
Geelong (103) defeated Greater Western Sydney (59) at Kardinia Park (Gee) [Geelong by 44) Geelong by 11
Port Adelaide (135) defeated Gold Coast (20) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Port Adelaide by 115) Port Adelaide by 52
Essendon (107) defeated Fremantle (92) at Docklands (VIC) [Essendon by 15) Essendon by 45
Richmond (122) defeated St Kilda (81) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 41) Richmond by 12
West Coast (100) defeated Adelaide (71) at Subiaco (WA) [West Coast by 29) Adelaide by 14

Qualifying Final

Adelaide (84) defeated Greater Western Sydney (48) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 36) Adelaide by 27
Geelong (40) lost to Richmond (91) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 51) Geelong by 12
Sydney (121) defeated Essendon (56) at S.C.G. (NSW) [Sydney by 65) Sydney by 47
Port Adelaide (76) lost to West Coast (78) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [West Coast by 2) Port Adelaide by 24

Semi Final

Geelong (98) defeated Sydney (39) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Geelong by 59) Sydney by 11
Greater Western Sydney (125) defeated West Coast (58) at Sydney Showground (NSW) [Greater Western Sydney by 67) Greater Western Sydney by 11

Preliminary Final

Adelaide (136) defeated Geelong (75) at Adelaide Oval (SA) [Adelaide by 61) Adelaide by 20
Richmond (103) defeated Greater Western Sydney (67) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 36) Richmond by 22

Grand Final

Adelaide (60) lost to Richmond (108) at M.C.G. (VIC) [Richmond by 48) Adelaide by 15Adelaide by 40 [offdef4g-95:79]

		Attack	Defence	Combined
1	Richmond	65.0	78.6	71.8
2	Sydney	64.8	73.4	69.1
3	Adelaide	70.3	65.5	67.9
4	Port Adelaide	58.2	72.0	65.1
5	Geelong	60.6	68.3	64.4
6	Greater Western Sydney	61.8	64.6	63.2
7	West Coast	59.1	61.5	60.3
8	Hawthorn	58.2	57.5	57.9
9	Collingwood	58.5	56.6	57.6
10	St Kilda	59.0	56.0	57.5
11	Essendon	60.5	54.1	57.3
12	Melbourne	56.4	57.1	56.8
13	Western Bulldogs	54.9	58.1	56.5
14	North Melbourne	57.7	49.5	53.6
15	Carlton	48.9	55.1	52.0
16	Brisbane Lions	56.6	43.0	49.8
17	Fremantle	46.6	51.4	49.0
18	Gold Coast	46.4	46.2	46.3

		Flagpole Height
1	Richmond	102.7
2	Adelaide	0.0
3	Sydney	0.0
4	Geelong	0.0
5	Greater Western Sydney	0.0
6	Port Adelaide	0.0
7	West Coast	0.0
8	Essendon	0.0
9	St Kilda	0.0
10	Collingwood	0.0
11	Hawthorn	0.0
12	Melbourne	0.0
13	Western Bulldogs	0.0
14	North Melbourne	0.0
15	Brisbane Lions	0.0
16	Carlton	0.0
17	Gold Coast	0.0
18	Fremantle	0.0