John I Dent Cup Preliminary Finals Preview and stats breakdown

Leading into second week of John I Dent Cup finals footy, our full stats breakdown is now available to view so fans can check out how their side is travelling ahead of their weekend matchups. 

See our full stats breakdown ahead of the Preliminary Finals below.

• The Tuggeranong Vikings have cemented their spot in the 2024 John I Dent Cup Grand Final with a six point win over Royals in last week's Preliminary final.
• The Royals will now take on Wests this weekends Preliminary final to see who will be Tuggeranong's dance partners next week.

• Wests Forced their way over the Eagles for each score of their match, resulting in six maul tries and five at the hands of Joel Pisu who was crowned player of the match.
• Meanwhile both Tuggeranong and the Royals managed a spread of tries sharing the Gilbert amongst both forwards and backs resulting in five-pointer for both sides.
• The Royals will be hoping the Wests backline has another quiet outing this week as they look for their own to fire through last week's try-scorers Jarrah McLeod and Zac Ross.

• The Canberra Royals have Wests' number when it comes to both average scoring and conceding points, something Wests will hope changes on Saturday.
• Wests just have the edge however in successful set piece percentage based off a combined total of scrum and lineout retention.

• Wests made the most of their sizable pack in thir Elmination Final matchup, winning all six of their scrums and also disrupting two of Gungahlin's, making it out of finals Week 1 as the only side boasting a perfect scrum success rate.
• The Royals will need to tidy up their lineouts ahead of this weekend, granted their 72% success may be attributed to Darcy Swain's impact from Vikings however, it is certainly something to be adressed before their next outing.
• Once again another show of Wests backs being unusually quiet, the side didn't manage any line breaks in their openg fiinals game of 2024.

Match Predictor: Royals: 66%, Wests: 34%.

Last 5 John I Dent Cup Matches: Royals 4 wins, 1 loss; Wests 2 wins, 3 losses.

Bonus fact:

The matchup this weekend will be the first Preliminary Finals meeting between Wests and Royals in over a decade.