TOTAL injury numbers across the League are up this season, but not by as much as you might think.

Richmond, Collingwood, Greater Western Sydney, Carlton, West Coast and Brisbane currently have extensive lists of players on the sidelines, but as the halfway point of the season approaches, the total number of games missed is largely in line with recent seasons.

Numbers provided by Champion Data show that following round 11, this year's Tigers have been one of the hardest hit clubs of any over the past five years.

And it's not the first time for the yellow and black.

Heading into round 12, Adem Yze's men have missed a total of 115 games due to injury to lead the competition.

It's the fifth most of any team since 2020, and slightly worse than last season where they had 110 games of absence.

Carlton (104), Fremantle (101), Hawthorn (94) and West Coast (90) are next on the list of hardest hit this year.

Although the Eagles are still one of the hardest it, this season pales in comparison to the dread of 2022 and 2023 where they'd missed 135 and 126 games, respectively.

Currently, teams are averaging almost 76 games missed through injury. That's an average of seven players on every club's injury list every week.

That's slightly up from last year (73.7) and more noticeably up from 2022 (67.5). 

It should be noted the one outlier season was the COVID-impacted 2021, where the prevalence of players missing through the League's health and safety protocols somewhat artificially inflated the numbers (83.1).

While the overall numbers are similar, what we can't account for just yet is the nature and severity of injuries and the standard of personnel they're affecting.

The Tigers are a case in point. Tom Lynch has missed eight games this season, as has Jacob Hopper, while Tim Taranto and Dylan Grimes have missed six apiece and Josh Gibcus (knee) is out for the season.

All players that are heavily relied on by a team projected to finish in the bottom half.

Brisbane's overall number is only slightly above League average, but ruptured ACLs to Keidean Coleman, Tom Doedee, Lincoln McCarthy and Darcy Gardiner, to add to the existing one suffered by Will Ashcroft, has hamstrung them somewhat.

The Magpies have 15 players on their injured list this week, the Giants 14. Carlton has suffered a lengthy list of soft tissue problems that have added up quickly.

Despite using the second most players in the competition (36), Gold Coast has the best availability of any club to date in 2024.

The Suns have missed just 43 games total through injury, with 11 of those to dashing defender Lachie Weller who is due back from a knee reconstruction in the next six weeks.

So, while it appears the League is going through an injury crisis of sorts, numbers through the first half of the season indicate it's only marginally worse than the previous four seasons.