Best time of the year; the weather is cold, the pubs are warm and welcoming and the annual battle of old foes will start shortly. For me this is probably between England, Wales and France with France being the favorite on recent form. I'd say England will have their heads up, but with the EPS announcement of this week there are less caps available to the starting 22 - the AB wini could be yet another false dawn. Mediocre form in the HC. France, look very strong in the HC but have a reputation of inconsistency. Wales, poor AI's from what is an established quad, very poor form in the HC. Scotland, more false dawns in the AI's, some real talent (which showed in the AI AB game) sunsequently falling over against much poorer opposition. Likely to man up and give Eng a real hard time in the opening game, which could easily go either way. Ireland, consistency problems, BOD past his sell by date, POC out with injury, as is Bowe. A few players who are probably starters in the Lions tour. Progressing in the HC, but Leinster struggling. Italy, Complete well for the wooden spoon; they'll probably continue to do so until they develop a decent domestic league. Sadly, I will not be able to attend any games this year
How are you all alone? One day before the big kick off this page should be buzzing! I agree with your assessment, both England and Ireland are in a transitional period, with England a bit further along. Although the team actually has less caps than this year, it is actually a more experienced side, last year's squad included a few old heads such as Palmer and Hodgson, a couple of guys with around 8 or 9 caps and then a whole host of players with 5 or less. Most of the players in that starting line up have 10+ caps now, with Goode, 36 and Launchbury standing out as the novices. Corbisiero is out which is a massive blow as Marler has been exposed at international level and we will learn a lot about Tom Youngs if he comes under a lot of pressure from the likes of Adam Jones. As an Englishman I'm quite optimistic about the future of the England team and I'll be disappointed if we don't get at least 4 wins. That said, it is still too soon to tell from this group of lads and the AB win could be a false dawn. The return of an in form Michalak should make the French a very though team to beat, they've struggled at 10 for a few years and the team has a good mix of youth and experience. It was only 11 months ago that Wales won the grand slam and were considered the great northern hemisphere team, but they have not had a good time since then. This 6 nations should teach us which was the 'real' Welsh tem, and which was the exception. Scotland are hideously underrated, capable of turning over any of the NH teams yet they always seem to find themselves battling it out for the wooden spoon. Maybe they're just not used to winning test matches? Capable of finishing anywhere from 3-6. Ireland are never push overs but they're in a transitional period with a number of world class players nearing the end of their international careers. One last hurrah from BOD makes lions selection interesting. Heaslip is my lions captain. Italy, have come a long way in the last 10 years but progress has stalled a bit for the last couple. Game is growing over there, and they are competitive, but still a few years away from being a success story like the Pumas. I'm fortunate enough to have taken a month of work in March to explore a bit of the continent so I will be in Rome to watched Italy vs Ireland! I'm taking my lions shirt so I will be supporting Brian O'Driscoll.
Scotland played a positive game which they should keep playing, it'll click at some stage and they'll start winning. Wales played half a game and would have threatened Ireland if they'd played both 1/2' s like the second. France bothered to play in 10 minute intervals, against an Italy who at last stopped relying on set pieces to score points - superb performance and I'm well chuffed for them. England, moved forward and proved that the AB game was no fluke, much to improve on but for a team of 200 caps, they are playing very well. Eng v Ireland next week is going to be great fixture!
The problem we've had since last year, and that we still have, is losing our head coach for a year to the Lions - we have got to stop agreeing to that (the same thing caused havoc for the Graham Henry era team). Rob Howley may be great within the coaching set up, but he is no head coach, for the same reason that he was a poor captain in his playing days. He gets down and flustered as soon as things go wrong, and he can't motivate others effectively. The team has great potential at the moment, but some serious problems with injury (second row in particular), problems with the coaching, and some strategic problems (in particular lacking imagination in the backs, and relying too heavily on big guys busting holes - we're also missing Shane Williams badly, and need to look for someone to give us that kind of creative option. Playing Halfpenny on the wing instead of at full back would help). Great game last week, though (I was there), and a great second half from Wales after an abysmal performance in the first. good to see Ryan Jones coming in for this afternoon - his experience and captaincy could make a big difference (as could Tipuric, who has definitely been the in-form flanker this season, and made a big impact coming on last week) As for the Championship, after the first weekend I would say it is genuinely anybody's for the taking. A really open one - even Italy could pull off more surprises, France and Wales might well improve, Ireland and England both still have potential weaknesses and frailties that are there to be exploited, and Scotland only have to match their finishing to their overall performance levels to start scoring serious points. It's going to be an interesting year!
A few amusing upsets -like Italy beating France and then Wales beating France. England looks ready to grand slam. I can't see France or Italy being any problem at all which leaves Wales who lost to a team that England doubled the score of. The chance of ANyone but England winning now is extremely unlikley. The chance of a Grand slam is very likley
Possibly, but you have to remember that Wales just didn't turn up at all in the first half of the Ireland game, but once they started playing they looked much the better team. They also beat France in Paris, which is not an easy thing to do. I wouldn't write Wales off just yet. Ireland have only lost one game, too, and so have Scotland (who are currently sitting second in the table, and very much improved this year under the new coach) - in fact, only France can really be written out of the running for top spot (although it would be a very brave and optimistic man to think that Italy could win!). England have to be favourites now, of course, but it's still quite an open championship, and coming to Cardiff on the last day certainly isn't likely to be any kind of an easy win for them unless the Welsh team suffers a catastrophic collapse (though that isn't impossible, as the first half against Ireland demonstrated!).
You're kidding. France have lost 2, but they are an exceptional team, they should be the current WC's. They'll turn up to London full of French indignance looking for one of those French games which define them.
Agreed, Wales away is one hell of a game, but in fairness "Wales collapsing"? They have already collapsed (sorry for the harshness), what is it now, 1 win in 10 or something? 10 in the world rankings? Still, I would bet on a Wales win in Cardiff, home advantage and the passion of playing England. Saying that, I said the same with Ireland. England have shown an ability to win in the dry against the AB's and the wet, away against the Irish. They look like a team of 22, no fancy dans, no game breakers, simply one unit.
Said Cynned with no nationalist bias whatsoever for (*)(*)(*)(*) sake if Italy beat France this year if Italy can beat France then they aren't much of a threat. The bookies, who frankly are the people who make a massive amount of money over being able make the right prediction give England 1-3 on. This year they are a pathetic team And yet they aren't ...and Italy's game shows that they aren't And they won't find it.
I'm not a 'nationalist', but of course I have no problem with supporting my own team - nothing wrong with that. It's beside the point, though - Wales might have lost a number of games in succession and had a very bad run of late, but no neutral observer could write them off at all - they still have an extremely talented squad of players (although injuries have been an issue of late), a very good coaching set up (although as I said before they are missing the head coach, which isn't helping), and did win a grand slam last year with pretty much the same team, and they did also win their last game. They are still a very capable rugby team, and still capable of winning games. I don't think Wales will win the championship this year (I suspect England probably will), but it is certainly far from being 'impossible' or even 'completely unrealistic' for them to do so at the moment. England look good for the championship, but the current team is certainly not (yet - relatively new/young team on the up, of course) 'indestructible' or 'unbeatable' at all. France clearly have problems at the moment, but it would be foolish to think that they don't have a good squad of players who are capable of playing some very good rugby if they get their act together.
I'm only pulling your chain ken. Sport is one of the few areas Ill indulge in a bit of pointless jingoism. The important part of the competetion is to see who comes second. I think England has it in the bag.Ruby isn;t as chancy as footy. The England team certainly isn't the team of a decade ago but its getting there. As for France 'getting you act together' is what its all about. Remember 1995 when the French just fell apart and started openly brawling with each other?
Nothing wrong with a bit of well placed pointless jingoism! In some ways I think that team was slightly overrated anyway, to be honest. They had some great forwards, but hardly an inspirational or creative back line (and I always thought Wilkinson was very overrated at outside half - great kicker, but not much else really - certainly no better than Neil Jenkins would have been had his pack not been retreating back towards him most of the time, and he was no Barry John!). They did win the world cup, fair enough, but I think it would be wrong to say that they won it 'in style' at all - it was pretty dull, forward-dominated rugby, relying mainly on kicked points. I wouldn't say they were really a truly 'great' team in the sense that something like the Wales teams of the 70's was (or some of the past All Black sides), if you see what I mean - truly world class individuals pretty much from 1 to 15, working together to make even more than the sum of its parts, and at times almost breathtaking in their creative ability as a group. Not to take anything at all away from what they achieved - their tactics were very effective at winning (often very close) games, just not very exciting to watch alot of the time! The new England team is looking like it has the potential to be better than that, to be honest (and I don't say that kind of thing lightly!), but they are still some way off that kind of form really, and I think still have the capacity to get rattled and nervy too (which is where Wales might do relatively well, if the pack are functioning, and Mike Phillips's mouth is at its best!). France do like to go their own way, and fly in the face of common sense - not only fighting amongst themselves, but picking players out of position for no apparently good reason.
Do you realise the immense damage done to Anglo Welsh relations by the fact that If you Are English and went to a rugby playing school in the seventies or eighties you almsot certainly had a complete <<<Mod Edit: Profanity removed>>> of a PE teacher from South Wales endlessly wibbling on about JJ and JPR. I had Three different ones
That's a lot of big talk there... the 6 nations doesn't work that way, both Wales and France are very capable of beating England. No team has this competition in the bag after 2 games...
Ive been watching the competetion for 40 years, thanks, I know how it works both Wales and France are very capable of beating England. They are ...just not this year. - - - Updated - - - It was the fact that they were also bastards. Didn;t give us a good opinion of the welsh. All repaired thanks to a certain Miss Wynne-Jones I met aged 15 on Holiday in Aberystwith.
Welsh PE teachers were no more pleasant in Wales, and neither was an English one that we had either - I think that, with the accumulated wisdom of our more advanced ages, we can probably all agree that judging a nation by its PE teachers is probably not a very good idea!
That's easy to explain. They don't let us out of the mines much, and when they do we have sheep, lovespoons and close harmony singing to attend to anyway. It's only the aspiring rugby players who are allowed to escape. Some of them didn't make the grade so ended up working as PE teachers rather than face the shame of going home as social outcasts and getting sent down the pit. Even the outside half factory has some rejects occasionally. That's what Wales is really like - everyone knows that!
A couple of interesting games yesterday (and some interesting happenings in the BBC commentary team for the Wales game - I don't think I can ever remember a commentator being taken ill during the game before! Winter vomiting bug, according to his twitter - he seems to be much better now). I thought Wales deserved the win, although it was tough in those conditions, and there were lots of errors from both sides. France looked much the better side for the first half of the other game, I though, although England did well to keep the score ticking over and stay with them. Different story in the second half, and France committed suicide by substitution in spectacular fashion. England deserved to win, but got lucky on the try decision (with the officials missing the accidental offside completely) - they didn't look as composed as they have done, though, and still look potentially beatable in the last game, if Wales fire on all cylinders and they don't (which is by no means certain, obviously!).
I got a little worried in the first half but then the French collapsed again in the second. I see no chance of anything other than a decisive win over Italy. The only real question is whether England wins on point difference or Gets a Grand Slam. I was surprised by Scotland's win over Ireland and since Ireland have beaten Wales this will certainly make possibly the most interesting game of the series. If Scotland Beats Wales then Wales is out but Since Scotland will probably beat France they could still end on the same number of wins as England but on lower PD unless there is a huge score in one of their matches. Wales has two tough matches and has to win both, and buy substantial margins,to win. My money is (literally) on a Grand Slam for England
England 36 points difference, and Wales 19 at the moment - that's not really a substantial lead at the moment, but I would think that they are likely to build up a few more against Italy. Nothing is settled yet, though, apart from the fact that it is now a straight 3 way fight, and one of those looks very much the outsider - it's not impossible for Italy to keep the England score down and Wales to storm through Scotland (if Scotland play like they did today). England certainly have to be favourites for the title, though, obviously. I though Ireland were pretty awful today, to be honest - they should have won by a mile with Scotland basically not turning up at all. Declan Kidney's position really has to be in doubt now.
I have to give you points for being absurdly optimistic. Lots of 'its not impossibles' and 'Its a 3 way fight' Ireland were Pathetic. They should have done better. But enough posturing. What is your actual prediction? I have put cash on an English Grand slam
