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Champion Data will put a greater emphasis on tracking AFL ball movement in 2026, while all state leagues and Under 18s games will get significant upgrades to their statistical captures for the upcoming season.
In what is a big win for club recruiters keeping tabs on the progress of juniors and state league coaching panels looking to gain more data, a raft of new stats will be available, including pressure ratings and centre bounce attendances.
In addition, more of an emphasis on tracking ball movement will be available to AFL teams, including tweaks to the ‘speed of ball movement’, which was introduced last year.
Here’s what’s new for Champion Data ahead of the 2026 AFL season.
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Champion Data will make a few changes for 2026, including tweaking its ball movement tracking, and introducing more stats for lower levels including Under 18s. ESPN/Getty Images
Full pressure and graphical capture for state leagues and Under 18s
Casual fans may not be too impressed by this, but club recruiters and coaching staffs at all levels will be loving this change.
For the first time, Champion Data will do full pressure and graphical capture for all state league (VFL, SANFL, WAFL), and Under 18s games in the Coates Talent League.
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Previously, Champion Data had only tracked ‘main capture’ stats at these ‘tier 2’ games, such as kicks, marks, contested marks, tackles, and contested possessions. The basic stuff, put plainly.
This year, there will be a massive step up, with full graphical capture coming to these contests. This includes all individual pressure acts, metres gained, one-on-one contests, centre bounce attendances, forward 50 targets, as well as team pressure, among others.
The caveat is that this won’t be done live. Main capture stats will remain so, but the complex stuff will be done back at the Champion Data offices after matches are complete. They may be delayed by a day or two, depending on the urgency of the match.
For example, Richmond VFL vs. Carlton VFL will be given full graphical capture priority over non-AFL-affiliated clubs. This will be done so coaching staff will be able to, for instance, weigh up the selection of a pressure forward for the next match. Being able to accurately compare players will be a gamechanger at the lower level.
The juniors will also have these stats captured for the first time, albeit delayed as well. Champion Data expects club recruiters to have a whole season’s worth of junior data in their hands by the end of September, as they ramp up their draft preparation.
Overall, Champion Data predicts an extra 100-150 hours per week of work capturing the complex data sets in state leagues and juniors.
Coates Talent League teams will have greater access to more stats in 2026. Asanka Ratnayake/AFL Photos/via Getty Images
A greater emphasis on tracking ball movement at AFL level
Expanded ‘speed of ball movement’ tracking
Last year, Champion Data introduced the tracking of ‘speed of ball movement’, basically looking at how quickly teams move the footy. The number 100 is the average, with 80 being quite slow and 120 being quite rapid. A higher number doesn’t necessarily correlate with being better, just faster.
It takes into account time (how long it takes to get rid of the footy once it gets to you), distance (how far each disposal travels, regardless of direction), and distance to goal (DTG — how many metres closer to your attacking goal the ball moves with each disposal). The competition average for each of these measures is also set at ‘100’.
So, what’s new? Firstly, there’s been further refinement on how the numbers are used. This year, Champion Data can break the numbers down to just set position disposals, turnover chains, and other contextual layers to provide further context to the raw numbers. Looking at last year as an example, Geelong moved the ball the fastest of any side from a set position, while Gold Coast were the most direct towards goal after a set position disposal.
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Expect to see this rolled out this year in broadcast coverage across TV and radio.
Stoppage exits
Champion Data is also honing its stoppage exit analysis for this upcoming season, with improvements to measure how teams move the footy away from congestion after a clearance, based on direction.
These include: Front, back, and side exits (both corridor and wing).
This will give coaches and analysts a greater understanding of how teams are exiting stoppages, and combining these stats with others such as the pressure factor (for example), may be able to understand why a team may be retreating from stoppage, playing safe to a wing, or moving the ball with dare — and then how these choices affect scoring.
In-to-out
Looking at how teams choose to exit congestion, Champion Data will track which players and teams are more likely to hold the ball and feed out of congestion, and which players and teams are more likely to try and burst from congestion.
For example, Lachie Neale is more likely to absorb the pressure in the contest and feed the footy out to teammates in space, while Chad Warner’s modus operandi is to break away from congestion himself using his speed and power.
At a team level, this will allow clubs to track how often they successfully exit congestion, the method used, as well as scoreboard returns, if any, they get from it. It can also be used in reverse; they can look at how they best restrict their opposition from doing the same thing.
45 kicks
Another important upgrade for 2026 is the live distribution to clubs and media of ‘the 45’, or 45-degree kicks.
Previously only available after matches, all 45 kicks will now be tracked and published live, following their initial introduction in 2025. The data will once again be split into inboard 45s (towards the corridor) and outboard 45s (towards the boundary).
Much like speed of ball movement, the ability to separate a team’s aggressive corridor use from safer boundary movement adds an important layer to ball-use analysis, particularly when assessing risk, and using in conjunction with defensive pressure.
A couple of examples from last season: GWS recorded the most 45 kicks per game of any side (18.9 per game) and Sydney was second, averaging 17.8 per game. GWS went inboard 38% of the time (ranked 16th) and the Swans went inboard 49% of the time (ranked No. 1).
Dayne Zorko finished with 55 ’45 kicks’ across the 2025 home and away season, five more than any other player. Lachie Ash was second with 50 across the same time frame.
Hear more from Champion Data’s Christian Jole EVERY WEEK on the ESPN Footy Podcast
Last touch rule
This is a small tweak, which brings consistency across all competitions recorded by Champion Data.
With the introduction of the last touch rule at AFL level, all leagues will now call such kicks as a last-touch instance, but these will not be counted as a free kick. For reference, AFLW has not been counting these as free kicks, but the SANFL has.
Players who commit a ‘last touch’, however, will have a turnover put against their name, but whether it’s a clanger may come down to a judgement call on the part of the Champion Data caller. The last touch itself won’t be a clanger, only the disposal preceding it might be.
Last touches will be collated, so place your bets now on who you think will have the most in 2026.
More game descriptors
Last year, and talked about on the ESPN Footy Podcast, Champion Data introduced a ‘game descriptor’. Basically, it determined if a game was a chaos game, or a control game. The difference? Chaos games had more ground ball gets than uncontested marks, and control games had more uncontested marks than ground ball gets.
Now, Champion Data has introduced a few more, nearly 25, including whether a game is transition vs. stagnant, high scoring vs. low scoring, high pressure vs. low pressure, contested vs. uncontested, central vs. boundary. Expect to see these stats rolled out in broadcast coverage this year across TV and radio.
The thresholds for these vary. For example, compared to chaos vs. control, in which the game descriptor is determined by which stat is higher, Champion Data will have the ability to update these benchmarks as the season progresses and the game changes.
Contested vs. uncontested game:
If at least 38% of possessions across a game have been won from a contest it is a contested game. Under 38% and it’s uncontested.
100 games were contested last season and 116 were uncontested.
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Transition vs. stagnant game:
A transition game is when the two teams move the ball from defensive 50 to forward 50 at least 22.5% of the time across the game. Stagnant is when the number is below this and the ball is not moving end-to-end as freely.
110 games were transition last season and 106 were stagnant.
High scoring vs. low scoring:
If the total aggregate match score is 169 points or more, it’s a high scoring game. Under, and it’s a low scoring game.
106 games were high scoring last season and 110 were low scoring.
High pressure vs. low pressure:
If the match pressure factor is 180 or above, it’s a high pressure game. Conversely, below 180 it is a low pressure game.
103 games were high pressure last season & 113 games were low pressure.
Central vs. boundary:
When teams are coming out of the back half, if they use the corridor area at least 50% of the time it’s a central game. If they use the wings more, it’s a boundary game.
107 games were central last season and 109 were boundary.
