Chiefs kicker Damian Mckenzie takes the crown for the Aotearoa Super Rugby’s Most Valuable Kicker for the Month of June.
With the three rounds of fixtures taking place throughout June marking the return of competitive Super Rugby for the first time in months, a level of rustiness and inconsistency in performance output is to be expected. But MacKenzie was able to demonstrate a level of reliability and consistency outweighing his kicking rivals to take top spot.
Sports analytics site
goalkickers.co.za calculate that out of the 5 possible candidates for the MVK title, Mackenzie had the second highest ‘average kick difficulty’.
Below are heat map’s that reflect the distance and area relative to the goal in which Mckenzie took his kicks, labelled with the success rate with which they were completed.
The Kiwi full back overall kicking percentage of 80%, missing only three of his 15 kicking attempts represents a solid output given the lack of match practice suffered by many players.
Mckenzie was also the only kicker throughout the three rounds who was able to finish with a ‘Value Added’ score of +1. Another metric used by Goalkickers that is used to calculate the Most Valuable Kicker. The Value Added score is an indicator to show the literal value added on to the scoreboard by a kicker compared to their kicking rivals. Calculating the number of points the kicker scored more than they were expected to when taking into account the difficulty of their kicks.
The Aotearoa Super Rugby competition continues throughout the month of July and with players getting up to full speed in terms of ability and fitness, we can expect the competition for July’s MVK to really begin to heat up.
July also sees the Australian competition getting underway with its first round of fixtures taking place.
To see more kicking statistics and to compare kickers across all Super Rugby Competitions go to
goalkickers.co.za
