Last weekend a pretty unique double occurred where both the AFL and the NRL simultaneously had games where the scores were level at full-time. At Etihad Stadium in Melbourne, St Kilda kicked a goal with 12 seconds remaining to level the scores with Hawthorn at 87-a-piece. While at WIN Jubilee Oval in Sydney, the Gold Coast Titans and St. George-Illawarra Dragons finished regular time at 10-all.
This unique circumstance had me thinking how different sports deal with a match that has no winner at the end of regulation time as well as the pros and cons of the different methods.
Let’s look at the AFL first. Simply, when the scores are level at full-time during the regular home-and-away season, the match is a draw and the teams equally share the points (2 points each).
A consequence of a game ending in a draw is the often hollow-feeling experienced by the players and the fans of both teams. It’s a big let down to ride the emotions of a tight contest to get to the end and realise that, though your team hasn’t lost the match, they haven’t actually won it either. It is this hollow-feeling and the desire to find a winner that is pushing the AFL to change it’s rules regarding drawn matches - the same reason why the NRL changed it’s rules 7 years ago.
In 2003, the NRL decided that games during the regular home-and-away season that were level at full-time should then go to what is known as golden-point extra-time. Basically, which ever team scores first during this extra-time period wins the game. The method of scoring this golden point is unrestricted - it can come from a try, penalty goal or from a field-goal. If after 10 mins (2 x 5 minute halves) of extra-time and the teams have failed to score, then the game is declared a draw. First-to-score overtime is also used in the NFL during it’s regular season games.
NRL’s golden point was developed out of football’s (soccer) “golden goal” that was first introduced during the late 90’s and was used during the 1998 and 2002 World Cups. Football’s thinking was that extra-time period’s had turned into dour, defensive affairs as both teams played a conservative approach and waited for the other team to make a mistake or fall back on the lottery of the penalty shoot-out.
Football had the right idea. As it is far more difficult to score in football than it is in most other sports (especially rugby league), it would seam fair that the first team to achieve this difficult feat would win the game. It was thought that this would promote attacking football and it would reward the teams that were more creative or took more risk. However, it went the other way and with the pressures of money, fame and trophies on the line, teams became even more conservative - teams were playing not to lose, rather than to win.
Football then decided to scrap the golden goal period and revert back to it’s old 2 x 15 min extra time period. It was thought that it was too unfair on the other team that was scored against and that they should be given a chance to get back in the game (UEFA experimented with silver goal, but that was also short lived).
The fact that football, a game where scoring is so difficult, decided that it was too unfair for it to be “first score wins”, highlights the biggest flaw regarding NRL’s (and also NFL’s) golden-point extra time. Simply, it is far too easy to score for it to be that the first team to score wins the match.
In the NRL, the most popular method of scoring during golden-point is the field goal. Scoring a field goal is quite easy as you do not need to break the defensive line and you need only to be within the opposition’s half of the field. Furthermore, it is not the main method of scoring during regular time (as opposed to football where there is only one method) as it only produces one point compared to 6 points for a converted try. In fact, probably over 90% of matches in the NRL would not involve a single field goal attempt - but during golden-point it suddenly becomes the best method of winning a game.
Therefore, the golden-point extra time effectively turns into a toss of the coin. As most (good teams) can drive their way to their opponents half inside a set of 6 tackles, and thus position themselves for a field goal attempt, whoever gets the ball in any sort of field position (apart from running it out of their own try line) basically wins the game. It’s too unfair for the match to be decided by a scoring method that is too easy and too infrequently used. This was best highlighted by the aforementioned St-George Illawarra - Gold Coast game - 10 minutes of field-goal attempts until the Gold Coast got one right with 40 seconds remaining.
The golden-point period turns into NRL’s version of a penalty shoot-out - players taking the easy, conservative approach of attempting a field goal instead of going for a try which was their main aim for the 80 mins (and the 100+ years) beforehand.
A far better approach would be to make it “golden-try” - still rewarding a team for scoring first but maintaining the main objective of rugby league - to score a try. The teams may still also kick a field goal or penalty goal to increase their score up until the end of extra-time but only a try would end the game straight away. I think fans would still be excited about a close contest where one score could end the game without turning the game into a field-goal-a-thon. The referees would also be under less pressure to call penalties, which, currently they are not doing as it almost guarantees a loss for the team that is penalised.
In the United States, drawn games are so much a faux-pas that all of ice hockey, basketball and baseball all have over-time during regular season games until there is a winner - regardless of how long it takes (or in the case of the NHL, a penalty shoot-out is needed). The NRL’s system also fails in this regard in that after 10 minutes of golden point that if no one scores then the game is a draw - a result that the golden point period was supposed to prevent.
But what is so wrong with a draw? If the scores of the two teams were pretty similar throughout the game and both teams were evenly matched in how they played, which is often the case in a draw, it’d be hard to disagree that both teams deserved to get something out of the game, i.e. competition points. While in the alternative scenario, if a team has come from a very large deficit to snatch a draw right on the final whistle then their players and fans would be emphatic and certainly would celebrate the draw as if it were a win. In this scenario, the circumstances of their comeback transcends any hollow-feeling even though they only drew the game.
What do you think about extra-time in your favourite sports. Should it be first-to-score wins? Should it depend on the scoring method? Should extra-time determine matches during the regular season as well as knock-out matches? Or should there be any extra-time at all?
Football- First to score a goal in extra time wins. If the scores are still level after extra time the goals are increased a metre every ten minutes until a goal is scored. Penalty shootouts are scrapped. This only applies for cup matches.
ReplyDeleteRugby (and league)- The same but golden try . And instead of increasing goal size, reducing number of men on the park by one every ten minutes
AFL- awarded to team with shortest shorts ensuring that they still have the female sport watching market tied up. So to speak.
Penalty shootouts are just the worst way to lose a match, and in my opinion, the worst way to win a match too. They are just too much of a lottery. I'm all for scrapping them...
ReplyDeleteReducing the number of players is a great idea that I've heard for a numbers of years now. I think they use it some junior competitions in various sports such as football and touch. I think that should be in place of both golden point and a penalty shootout.
Love the idea for AFL - it would definitely help to promote the game in women, lol! Though I'd like to know what happened if the length of shorts were also the same!!! Biggest average biceps circumference???
Hey Ben, some interesting comments there.
ReplyDeleteFirst off, as for penalty shootouts in soccer (using this term for the sake of clarity), I don't mind them. They are fairly lucky from the keeper's point of view, but from the shooters perspective there isn't any luck involved. If you shoot it hard enough to one of the corners, it's not possible for a keeper to stop it. If you shoot it slower or closer, and the keeper happens to stop it, it is lucky for the keeper, but it just means the shooter sucked. There is actually skill involved, especially for the shooter, and even for the keeper as well.
The idea of playing with less players was used in the 2010 winter olympics for hockey as well (http://www.nhl.com/ice/page.htm?id=60725). It works out pretty well in that game, since it's so back and forth, and while it is golden goal I don't know of too many that complain about that. It's not a game where getting the first possession matters that much, offense and defense are equally very important, and you can't just defend because it's always possible to score.
And one thing I was happy about was that ESPN showed the first CFL game of the year in the USA (CFL starts several weeks earlier, we're already 5 games in). One of the two first games was the Riders vs Alouettes, a repeat of the Grey Cup final last year. It was a crazy game, and ended up in overtime. There's an overview of the rules here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overtime_%28sports%29#Professional and I hope a lot of Americans were left wondering why they use the current system in the NFL. Basically, each team gets possession from a fixed point, and whoever has the highest scored after their possession wins (read up on the rules for the specifics). There's a lot of history and explaining behind what happened, but basically the Rider's got the maximum 8 points on their first possession, and then stopped the Al's, but the Al's got a second chance because of a penalty (same one that decided the Grey Cup the previous year). Then the Al's get the max 8 points, and we go into the second and final overtime period, where the Rider's finally pulled it off. It was crazy, very exciting, completely fair, and resulted in a clear winner. The problem with american or canadian football is that a lot of teams are asymmetrical when it comes to defense and offense, they're really good at one or the other. Offense can be quite random as well, all it takes is one good play to score a point, while defense usually requires 2 or 3 to stop them. I've heard some people complain that "defense is part of the game, just stop the other team," but that's ignoring the fact that offense is part of the game too. In other sports, like NRL and hockey, defense and offense are very closely connected, but in football there's a huge disconnect (rarely does a player do both), and I don't think it makes much sense to have a game decided on the merits of only half of each team.
Hey Jay, good to see you are reading and hopefully enjoying the blog.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if I agree 100% with the penalty shoot-out. I'd rather not have it then to have it. There is definitely a skill component to it (as is kicking field goals) but in 9/10 times I think it's all about if the goal keeper picks the right side to dive to. They have to pick which way to dive (if at all) before the player makes contact with the ball so in essence it's a toss of the coin. Obviously, it's not as simple as that but I don't think a game (especially a World Cup) should be a decided by which way the goal keeper dives.
I also think it's funny when commentators say "that was a poor penalty from the striker" when it gets saved if they haven't aimed it right in the corner of the goal. They don't say it's a poor penalty when the goal keeper has "guessed" the wrong side and they kick it in the goal without going near one of the corners. Basically, they're defining a poor penalty on how successful the goal keeper is at guessing which way the striker will go before the striker kicks it.
I didn't hear that about the Ice Hockey at the 2010 Olympics but I think that's a fantastic idea. I think that works well for Ice Hockey. Difficult sport to score in so golden goal is warranted and they are trying to avoid a penalty shoot-out by taking a player off every few minutes. I like it.
That's pretty interesting about the CFL. I'll have a look at the rules and I'll try and view that game to check out how it works. That's a bit different but it's overcoming one of the things I don't like about first-to-score wins in sports were it's easier to score (and that you touched upon as well) - it's unfair on the team that doesn't have the ball. That's why golden point in the NRL is inherently flawed.