Australia played New Zealand in Melbourne with the roof closed and the turf soft and the All Blacks rampant, winning 49-28. We give some statistics from a fast and fascinating Tri-Nations match.

Sanctions

Sanctionary Cards

There were three yellow cards this week, two of them for the same player, which meant a red card. This may have spoilt a potentially great game which started with a flash.

Yellow cards

Own Franks (New Zealand) - armless tackle
Drew Mitchell (Australia) - armless, late tackle
Drew Mitchell (Australia) - preventing a quick throw-in by slapping the ball out of an opponent's hand.

The two yellow cards for Mitchell added up to a red card, and Australia played for 38 minutes with 14 men. In fact they had 14 men for 48 minutes of the match.

Recipients of yellow cards in Tri-Nations so far:

Bakkies Botha (South Africa) - tackle infringement
Danie Rossouw (South Africa) - kick
Jaque Fourie (South Africa - dangerous tackle
Quade Cooper (Australia) - dangerous tackle
BJ Botha (South Africa - tackle infringement
Own Franks (New Zealand) - armless tackle
Drew Mitchell (Australia) - armless, late tackle
Drew Mitchell (Australia) - preventing a quick throw-in by slapping the ball out of an opponent's hand.

Cited and suspended

Nobody.

Cited and Suspended in Tri-Nations so far

Bakkies Botha (South Africa) for a headbutt - suspended for nine weeks
Jean de Villiers (South Africa) for a tip tackle - suspended for two weeks
Jaque Fourie (South Africa for a dangerous tackle - suspended for four weeks
Quade Cooper (Australia) for a dangerous tackle - suspended for two weeks

Penalties conceded

In this section we record the times a team was penalised.

Australia vs New Zealand

Total number of penalties: 24

Australia: 11
New Zealand: 13

The reasons for the penalties were as follows:

* = points conceded

Australia:
Tackle/ruck/maul: 7 (Moore* 2, Giteau, Elsom 2, Horne, Brown)
Discipline: 4 (Mitchell - late, no arms; Elsom* -dissent; Genia - +10; Mitchell - knocking ball away in touch)

New Zealand:
Tackle/ruck/maul: 5 (Owen Franks*, McCaw 2, Nonu, Mealamu)
Off-side: 3 (Woodcock*, 'whole backline', Sam Whitelock)
Scrum: 2 (Woodcock 2)
Discipline: 3 (Owen Franks - shoulder charge; Muliaina* - + 10; Sam Whitelock - dangerous tackle)

Australia side missed a penalty kick at goal.

Tackles/Penalties

This gives the number of penalties at ruck/tackle as a fraction of the total number of penalties: 12/24 - 50%

Getting possession - line-outs, scrums, free-kicks, drop-outs

In this section the figures represent the number of times you get to play with the ball.

Australia:
Line-outs: 7 (1 lost, 1 free kick, 1 quick)
Scrums: 9 (1 resets, 7 collapses, 1 lost, 2 penalties)
Free-kicks: 2 (line-outs)
Drop-outs: 0

New Zealand:
Line-outs: 9 (2 free kicks, 1 skew)
Scrums: 3 (1 reset, 2 collapses)
Free-kicks: 2 (1 scrum, 1 line-out)
Drop-outs: 1

Stoppages (total of line-outs, scrums with resets, free kicks, penalties, drop-outs): 59

This is a low number of stoppages.

Scoring

Tries

This is the number of tries each team scored.

Australia: 3 (Mitchell, Elsom, Ashley-Cooper)
New Zealand: 7 (Muliaina 2, Jane, Carter, McCaw, Rokocoko, Flynn)

Tries/penalties scored

This gives the ratio of tries scored to penalties scored by each team:

Australia: 3/3
New Zealand: 7/2

The ratio of tries scored to penalties goaled is 10/5

Some Totals in the 2010 Tri-Nations

Penalties conceded per country

Australia: 7 + 11 = 18
New Zealand: 12 + 9 + 13 = 34
South Africa: 5 + 9 + 10 = 24

Tries scored per country

Australia: 2 + 3 = 5
New Zealand: 4 + 4 + 7 = 15
South Africa: 0 + 2 + 2 = 4

Disciplinary sanctions per country

Australia: 4Y, C
New Zealand: Y
South Africa: 4Y, 3 C

Y = yellow card
C = citing and suspension