Experimentation during a season is only valid if there’s a real probability of success and/or there’s nothing to lose, ie we’re gonna try something against this one opponent because we’ve not gotten it right in the past and continuing to play the same way is asking for a beatdown - that’s what Dome did against RB and it worked because RB wasn’t expecting it and it was just a small twist on the then current tactics. However, experimenting for 10 matches with no success is the same as driving a rudderless boat and expecting to work a slalom flawlessly - it’s wasteful and set up for failure, and at the end of the day didn’t advance the team or season at all.
Sorry, but the results of the experimenting carry the same weight as the “serious” matches and the cumulative results are somewhere between mediocre and downright trashy. The CCL lead we had should never have been blown, it was just about impossible to do, and yet it was done spectacularly with the finesse of a brain surgeon using a chainsaw.