What a first round that was: grit, determination, superb skills and complete brainfarts. Think the competition is wide open, and unsure where to make your Superbru picks? Don’t worry, our OvallyBalls experts on crack are here to progrocknIksate what will happen this weekend.
Deebee7 was quick off the mark with his predictions:
England, chastised and sobered by the realisation that they couldn’t simply kick ‘n bosh their way past feisty Scotland pick the biggest side in rugby history so they can KICK ‘N BOSH their way over, through and not around Italy, who, having realised that their first-up tackling was well below par and know what’s coming their way, pick 15 Saffas to BOSH BACK against England. Problem is, they’re playing for Italy because they can’t make it into better sides. England by 47 despite themselves.
Scotland, fresh from the Trashing of Twickers™ are primed, ready, purring and full of confidence for the visit of an abject Welsh side that had to rely on red mist and a brain fart to see off Ireland. The mercenary English Army and Tartan Boks who were apparently the only reason Edward’s Army tripped at Twickers have a solid tight five, fury in the loose forwards, flying outside backs and the Best 10 in the World™ ready to unleash hell on the journeymen from the Valleys. Thing is, it’s not their Game of the Season™ and with all their raison d’etre exhausted last week, Wales will give them the fright of their lives! But not enough to actually win it. Scotland by a couple in a low-scoring affair.
Ireland, stunned by stupidity and seething with intent, await the thoroughbreds of France, fresh from their opening training run against Italy. Expect a titanic struggle up front with neither pack giving an inch (easy on the Karl button, Iks). Ireland should be without Sexton which gives France a HUGE advantage behind the pie-munchers, and with the greyhounds and whippets willing to give it a lash, it could be a long afternoon at the Palindrome. But if the Irish are one thing, it’s bloody minded, determined and fucking difficult to boss around on their home patch (thank dog no World Cups hosted there yet). Too close to call!
Chimpie is more or less in agreement:
Scotland > Wales by 4
This goes against my deep-seated pessimism but got to back form at some point. General cohesion will keep Wales pinned back but usual inability to get points on the board will keep the boyos in it. Wales have some quality players in there and they’ll get over the line a couple of times.
England > Italy by 30
Hope Italy put up more of fight than last week. They’ve got a few bright sparks – like the look of Garbisi – but this is a very young and inexperienced team, too early for them to start pulling out results. England will grind and kick Italy down and run up a respectable score with the Best Fly-Half in the World playing. Eddie will then drop Ford for the next game.
Ireland > France by 2
Yes, I’m going out on a limb here for Ireland without human missile POM to put a shock one over on France. Would it be that much of a shock though? France ran up 35 points against Ireland last time out but there was only an 8 point difference at full time. Ireland at home hurting after last week’s effort vs. Wales, I’m going with a home victory here.
ClydeMillarWynant is ever the misfit:
Wales > Scotland by 1
Entire game takes place in Wales half giving Scotland an impressive 6-0 lead only for LRZ to go the length of the field at the death. Biggar converts from the touchline and bounces around on his space-hoppers to general disgust.
France > Ireland by 6
Ireland are just the sort of miserable bastards to spoil everything by grinding down France and stopping the beautiful game at source. But there’s been positive beaver news today.
England > Italy by 40
Italy are crap.
BorderBoy couldn’t resist bringing Prog into it:
Nazareth > Budgie (by 10)
Genesis > PFM (by 25)
U2 < Lazuli (by 12)
SladeIs#42 is sucking up to the mister:
Wales> Scotland by 4 – winners have enough ‘dog’ to resist Scots missing last week’s adrenalin rush
Ireland > France by 3 – game of the week-end – Ireland a team full of grit and experience
England > Italy by 25 – in reality, score could be anything dependant on tactics adopted: an inaccurate kicking game could make it closer, as could a good performance by Italy up to the 60 minute mark causing confusion in England’s headless ranks. If Italy collapse England could get 70. Whatever, it’s unlikely to be a credit to the Competition. As stated above, Ford will be back to the bench afterwards and George restored.
Craigsman is getting all political on our arses:
Sturgeon > Drakeford by 5LePen Macron > Adams by 10
Bojo > Berlusconi by 15
I was just going to include far right politicians / arseholes. I managed a few arseholes but couldn’t be bothered to Welsh political arseholery.
Sunbeamtim goes for the philosophical approach:
Looks like Big Faz realises that France are going to hammer Ireland whichever way, so has thrown in a 9 and 10 as sacrificial lambs to protect young payers. End of JGP and BB’s International careers ?
Very enthusiastic about all the talk of how disgraceful Italy are, and how they should be thrown out of the comp, and how its a non game for a proper side. I see Italy as being fitter and more coherent than they have ever been, and one step off defensively is all it takes to be hammered by a Tier one side. Setting someone up for a big fall somewhere this season.
Scotland and Wales both hammered by injuries, too close to call, game of the weekend.
Flair99‘s been watching my nightmares:
England by 29
Scotland by 7
France by 11.
Don’t harrumph me, I was wrong twice last week.
Not sure the omission of Sexton and Murray is a good thing for France but it is certainly a good thing for them. Enough of these concussed players blaming the doctors. I hope they recover soon.
Onna telly this week
Friday 12th February
| Gloucester v Bristol | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
| Sale v Bath | 20:00 | BT Sport Extra |
Saturday 13th February
| England v Italy | 14:15 | ITV |
| Harlequins v Leicester | 16:00 | BT Sport Extra |
| Exeter v London Irish | 16:15 | BT Sport Extra |
| Scotland v Wales | 16:45 | BBC1 / S4C |
Sunday 14th February
| Worcester v Wasps | 13:00 | BT Sport 1 |
| Ireland v France | 15:00 | ITV |
Ovally Balls 
Thaum,
A lot depends on the period, I suppose—it would be difficult to remain indifferent in the middle of the religious wars, which took up large chunks of centuries, or trying to guess which Prayer Book is going to get you burnt this week under the later Tudors. I suspect it was a matter of keeping your head down and not questioning things, rather than ignoring religion completely.
I’ve read The Name of the Rose, and The Island of the Day Before — much preferred the former and can’t remember anything about the latter. I’ve been meaning to read Foucault’s Pendulum for years and never got round to it. I’ve just splashed out £1.99 for the Kindle edition — thanks for the reminder!
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FP is fab! The Island is one I very much enjoyed on first reading – brilliant concept – but when I tried to re-read it, couldn’t get through it. Perhaps my mood at the time.
On the religious stuff, I doubt most people would have had a prayer book, not being literate. Certainly there would have been nods to the latest religious fad of the local lord, but that would equally apply to fads in agricultural methods.
Much as we drones today bow to the latest management fads in our workplaces. There is a strong hint of ‘hunt the heretic’ in the current environment for me, so we just mock it behind their backs and nod sagely in front of their backs.
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Just to belabour the metaphor, the religion – and it is a very cultish religion – in question is Agile (TM) Methodology. On the face of it, it seems all right for a small development team on a small project. Where it falls down is when you have very large-scale operations such as ours.
There’s even a proper schism and everything between the founders on how to handle this obvious problem.
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Thaum – I like Borges. The Garden of Forking Paths is a great story too.
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“The Garden of Forking Paths”
I think this is how my kids would describe any of the trips to various National Trust places that Mrs CMW drags us to if only they had the necessary vocabulary. Until we (finally from their point of view) reach the play area.
Death and the Compass is a favourite.
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When I last had a GP that I could refer to as ‘my doctor’ I had a very enjoyable conversation about Borges with him. He was totally useless apart from that mind.
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@Thaum – You will be shocked to hear that I miss my former employer’s company religion not one bit. We were a backwater so didn’t really have to play ball, at least not entirely, but it had songs and everything. It was just a Toyota ripoff of course. Used to have to go to Crewe occasionally for indoctrination – how they ever thought they were on to a winner with that I’ll never know – and would come away thinking of Vonnegut’s Player Piano. Only thing I’d really like to know is whether Tony Blair got his mannerisms from our guy or the other way round as both are possible.
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I’ve read Death and the Compass, but not the Garden of Forking Paths. I’ll look for it.
Think I’ve read Player Piano, but not sure.
The founder of our new religion (a forriner from another company) is tall, dark and handsome. He brought a priest with him to explain the gospel. The priest is a long-haired neck-beard with no chin and no charm. I was trying to work out whose mannerisms the priest’s reminded me of, when I finally realised it was the founders’: they are so dissimilar-looking and -sounding that it was odd when I clocked it.
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@thauma
Ah, good old Agile. Nowt wrong with it as a means to an end, but these things can become the end themselves if too many people forget why they’re there.
By coincidence I was interviewed on my views on Agile this week and I warned them to keep it principles-based rather than rules-based.
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@Thaum – Player Piano was his first book and he hadn’t sorted his style out. It’s a very long time since I read it and I don’t think it’s as funny as any of the others, but it has a good corporate religion event in it.
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Looks bad for France XV. The week before playing Ireland they trained with France Sevens. The 7 players were all tested negative prior to the training session, and yet most of them tested positive this week.
ATM only Servat, Galthié and another coach tested positive but although not yet positive, several of the XV players have a “high viral charge”, whatever that means. Most people expect a few players to test positive today. What next?
Lose to Scotland 28-0 or field an entirely new squad, like vs England in the Autumn Cup.
Hoping the Irish don’t get sick as well. What a dreadful mess.
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That sucks somewhat. Firstly, hope all of them are fine and it doesn’t spread any further.
presume delaying the match isn’t an option & that same rules as autumn cup apply. would be classic scotland for France to field a totally new squad & lose…..
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Any particular reason that delaying it isn’t an option?
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Am up for the Borges as well, but a long while ago since I read him.
Anthony Burgess begins the first volume of his autobiography the way he means to go on with a fantastical story about him and Borges sitting in a hotel talking in Anglo-Saxon about how they must be related because of the names.
Cortazar’s probably my favourite of those 20th Century LatAm giants. The book he wrote with Carol Dunlop, his wife, is great. And has a great title: The Autonauts of the Cosmoroute.
There’s a line from Borges and Cortazar to Bolano.
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Can see Scotland ending up beating England and France away and losing to Wales and Ireland at home. Reasonably confident that’s something they’ll never have done before.
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‘Any particular reason that delaying it isn’t an option?’
cos rules
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Game isn’t going to be cancelled by an outside agency (i.e. government) like last Spring.
Rules for the autumn thingy were field a team or take a BP beating. Not sure if these are the rules that apply this 6N
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It’s a great set of rules that make it impossible to postpone a game when everyone knew that might be necessary given that in the past it’s often been possible to postpone a game when nobody expected to need to.
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On the subject of short stories I re read ‘The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas’ (by Ursula Le Guinn) last year. One of my favourite short stories anyway.
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WP reacts to his new contract
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Chimpie, the 6 Nations organisers said last month that their preference is for games to be postponed rather than cancelled. There’s another free weekend after round 3 so it might be that Scotland play France then. Or the French government might call it off. Who knows?
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ticht, who’s the guy next to him who ain’t getting a new contract?
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My wife was a fan of Agile, she said that it kept the process moving and not stuck in a developers’ bubble waiting for perfection, which will never happen and it will be superseded by the time it gets to near perfect anyway.
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Richie Gray, Tom
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actually, maybe it’s not Richie Gray, at first look I thought it was him, but he doesn’t look six foot ten or whatever there
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If it’s not him, Gray has a dead ringer
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I Googled Agile for a job interview once and managed to bs my way to the next round. My cover was blown in the next interview though.
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I think I’ve cracked it, it must be Jonny Gray
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I am sure that France would take a 0 – 28 loss to Scotland rather than field a 2nd/3rd XV and break Scotlands’ hearts………………………….surely?
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Slade, I would honestly prefer to play the game, win or lose.
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Edinburgh v Munster Murrayfield Sat 20th, 7.35pm.
Edinburgh: 15. Damien Hoyland 14. Jack Blain 13. Mark Bennett 12. Chris Dean 11. Eroni Sau 10. Jaco van der Walt 9. Henry Pyrgos CO-CAPTAIN
1.Pierre Schoeman 2. David Cherry 3. Lee-Roy Atalifo 4. Andrew Davidson 5. Grant Gilchrist CO-CAPTAIN 6. Nick Haining 7. Luke Crosbie 8. Viliame Mata
Substitutes:
16. Mike Willemse 17. Boan Venter 18. Murray McCallum 19. Magnus Bradbury 20. Ally Miller 21. Charlie Shiel 22. Nathan Chamberlain 23. Matt Currie (0)
Munster: Mike Haley; Andrew Conway, Chris Farrell, Damian de Allende, Shane Daly; JJ Hanrahan, Craig Casey; James Cronin, Niall Scannell, John Ryan; Jean Kleyn, Billy Holland (C); Jack O’Donoghue, Chris Cloete, Gavin Coombes.
Replacements: Kevin O’Byrne, Jeremy Loughman, Stephen Archer, Fineen Wycherley, Jack O’Sullivan, Nick McCarthy, Ben Healy, Rory Scannell.
Munster fans are saying “we should win this by a distance”
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‘Your’ Exeter team to face Saints this w/end:
15 Stuart Hogg, 14 Tom O’Flaherty, 13 Tom Hendrickson, 12 Ollie Devoto, 11 Josh Hodge
10 Harvey Skinner, 9 Jack Maunder
1 Alec Hepburn, 2 Jack Yeandle (capt), 3 Harry Williams, 4 Will Witty, 5 Sam Skinner, 6 Dave Ewers, 7 Richard Capstick, 8 Sam Simmonds
16 Jack Innard, 17 James Kenny, 18 Marcus Street, 19 Don Armand, 20 Sean Lonsdale, 21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne
22 Joe Simmonds, 23 Ian Whitten
Nice to have Hogg playing; Vermeulen, Kirsten and Nowell being saved but are now fit to play; Joe Simmonds being protected after last week’s head bash – Skinner the younger staying in place.
Bit of a calculated risk against an improving Saints but bigger things to follow, starting with Sale the week after.
Should be a good game to watch…………………
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TomP – I’ve read Cortazar’s Hopscotch, which is designed to be read in any chapter order, with two main suggestions (the one in which it’s printed, and then another one with a Goto: Chapter x at the end.
Ticht – Agile is fine for a small team working on a discrete project. It’s really rubbish at handling complex enterprise development.
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Sorry, but that’s ridiculous.
Since the start of the year, Stuart Hogg’s been in the Exeter ‘bubble’, Scotland ‘bubble’, Exeter ‘bubble’, Scotland bubble, Exeter ‘bubble’. After this game he’ll go back to the Scotland ‘bubble, probably back to the Exeter ‘bubble’, back to the Scotland ‘bubble’ for the final two games, and then back to Exeter for the rest of the season. I get that Exeter pay his wages, but FOR THIS YEAR ONLY, it would have made more sense to cut down on the movement between club and country. I’m using Hogg as an example, but he’s obviously not the only player in this situation. I realise that these players will also be tested frequently, but why take that risk? We’ve already seen what’s happened with some of France’s coaches, and Exeter themselves had to call off games earlier due to players getting COVID.
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A friend of mine writes; (he is an Englishman, the value of this piece of information will become apparent in short while)
So vaccinations are on everyone’s mind at the moment and it is widely known that the English invented everything.
So every schoolboy knows that Edward Jenner performed the first smallpox vaccination in 1796. A fact only slightly spoiled by the actuality that this is bollocks on a very large stick.
In 1717 Lady Mary Wortley Montagu travelled to Constantinople where she heard that old Greek Christian women were performing “ingrafting” whereby thousands of Turks were happily accepting infection with smallpox pus as a preventative cure.
Mary had suffered from the pox to which her ravaged and scarred face bore testimony and her brother had died from it. She steeped herself in Ottoman culture and eventually had her 5yr old son successfully inoculated.
Mary returned to London and agitated for inoculation. Doctors were rather put out by a woman campaigning for a process managed by Oriental women. One asked “how can it be that an experiment practised only by a few ignorant women amongst an illiterate population be successful?”
Mary stuck to her guns and the doctors were eventually won over. But they had to own and westernise the procedure. So what was a small simple cut and infection in a party atmosphere in Constantinople was changed completely. Deep incisions were made causing massive infections and then months of bloodletting and laxatives were prescribed.
The Prince and Princess of Wales remained unconvinced and so six Orphans were rounded up, forcibly treated and then paraded at a house in Soho for their inspection.
Centuries before all this the Chinese were blowing dried up smallpox material up noses. The Arabs were introducing smallpox pus under the skin and the practice was widespread in Africa.
But don’t let me bore you with fake news – the English man invented vaccines and women and bloody Arabs had nothing to do with it!
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ticht, that tale’s also told in a recent London Review of Books article: https://lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n03/steven-shapin/a-pox-on-the-poor
Your English friend forgot this bit:
And as early as 1600, inoculation was folk medical practice in Pembrokeshire, where it was popularly known as ‘buying the pocks’.
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Ticht, it’s a classic in science history .
It’s the same here in France where most people are convinced Pasteur invented vaccination (no one has heard of Jenner) whereas, with a few exceptions, he mostly synthesised what others had discovered before him. Doesn’t make them less great though because they proved their point. Therefore making the process repeatable and saving millions lives.
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Jenner’s trick was using cowpox rather than small pox (or small pox scabs or whatever) to prevent small pox, which I think is vaccination rather than variolation.
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@tomp
That’s right. Exposing someone to tiny amounts of smallpox was obviously risky. The beauty of Jenner’s approach was that it removed the possibility of giving someone the disease they were trying to prevent. And therefore he was the first to do genuine vaccination.
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His nan must’ve been Welsh. It’s the only explanation.
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Yep, that was Jenner’s great intuition, to inoculate cowpox, not very dangerous per se, as a mean of preventing smallpox.
BTW, smallpox in French is “vaccine”. So the word vaccination is another French cultural appropriation. Shame on us. Should be cowpoxisation. Doesn’t t have the same ring, though.
Jenner must have had a fantastic reputation for the arguably most famous person of the time, Napoléon, had his son vaccinated to prevent smallpox. Celebs endorsing products, huh? Plus ça change…
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Jenner appropriated it from the Latin to make himself look posh.
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How some saw vaccination in the early days:
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It’s a bit like the “DNA altering” Pfizer and Moderns vaccines we have now.
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A dairy farmer in Shropshire put a secret tracking device in every vaccination. It’s how they were able to capture Napoleon’s son.
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‘Rail industry leaders have proposed building a tunnel between Scotland and Northern Ireland to a group tasked with exploring ways to improve connectivity between the four constituent parts of the UK.’
Probably a better idea than a bridge
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Still a tad expensive though. Not sure what the geology’s like under that part of the Irish Sea RE feasibility.
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It’s very deep and there are loads of bombs down there. It won’t happen.
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If I may borrowa term; Pffft!
Johnnie Notions to you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnnie_Notions
Shetland’s Finest.
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Can avoid the bombs if your tunnelling.
although vibration / settlement could set them off. Just put the route around them.
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