I’ll try to keep this as short as possible.
Three games this week-end; that is, if France once again do not shrug their way out of the most porous bubble (called a sieve here, see below) ever seen since John Boyd Dunlop invented the flat tire.
The teams:
England: At the moment they look like a good example of someone’s definition of madness: do the same thing over and over and expect a different result.
Wales: Don’t call them fortunate; they hate it. Napoléon would have a word with Pivac though. A disastrous autumn followed by a welcome revival. Tedious at times, lethal sometimes. Will finish first unless France get a GS.
France: Will achieve a GS (see Wales).
Ireland: Stale but still mid-table. Reaching their tipping point on the declankidney-o-meter. That green jersey looks more and more like a corset, including to the meanies usually in blue.
Scotland: The perennial underachiever. Couldn’t even beat covided France by forfeit. Lovely to watch though. Definitely the colour of a dark horse.
Italy: they prove that the old adage “it’s easier to organise defence than attack” is plain rubbish. They produced lovely moves but they could not catch a slug on a Zimmer frame.
The games:
Italy vs Wales: makes me sad that a 6 Nations game is a foregone conclusion. Italy have unearthed some exciting new players but they lost what was their main strength, a solid if unimaginative pack. Their scrum is so wobbly they could hire Australians to improve them, the line-out is a mess and their defensive line look from above like a child’s drawing of a bolt of lightning. The only uncertainty is whether Wales will get the bonus point before or after the oranges. As for Wales, it’s a bit strange not to experiment a bit more, most of the team being a known quantity. Pivac probably wants battle hardened warriors for next week’s game, but it looks like a missed opportunity to blood new players. I’ll watch it, if only for AWJ and of course for Liam Williams: he may look like a horse rider but he’s a superb full back.
England vs France: both teams pick themselves but for different reasons. Eddie is so conservative he’d make Maggie look like a socialist. Apart from the obvious, he seems quite reluctant to change a formula that has shown its limitations. Scotland, who play a similar game to France, cruelly exposed them. And so did Wales in a different style. In both games England seemed incapable of changing gear and controlling their discipline. Of course, they’ll be more fit and the inclusion of Malins will bring more threat but Daly is still on the bench. Funny how a vibrant club game does not translate into a more fluid national squad.
France easily beat England in Paris last year and came close to winning the AI cup with a B team. It certainly helps in terms of confidence, but this is different. They might be as rusty as England, after the covid bubble burst. They also have the same problem as England in terms of discipline and the team that will remain on Andrew Brace’s side will take a big step ahead. But France have been rebuilding seriously for the past two years, they have a young but settled team, they know what to do and they’ll trust their ability to do it. A curiosity: France’s bench will be 6/2 whereas England’s will be 5/3.
I can see only one outcome. If the packs cancel one another, which I expect, then France have more threat in the backs. France by one score. With a bonus point, like Wales? Nah. A win would be good enough.
Scotland/Ireland: this should be a cracking game and it’s a hard one to call. Both teams lost to Wales, with one man down, but in different fashion. Both could’ve won (fine margins etc.) but I thought Scotland were the most enterprising of the three.
Ireland play a well-rehearsed game, easy to read, hard to stop. Sexton is a fading force but the way they play, he can still do the job for a couple of years. What’s that I hear? Deep sighs from the notablog showrunner? And where is Cooney, anyway?
I expect a lot of box-kicking, some good chases, some not so good and then beware Hogg and friends.
Just like France, Scotland might be a bit rusty for missing a game but I heard they played within their clubs. They should play a looser game than Ireland, with more unpredictability. Finn had a mediocre game last week with Racing. Was he keeping his powder dry? It does not really matter because Scotland have proven last year they can play without Finn, and well.
My money would be on a Scotland win but not by much.
I hope you all enjoy the week-end of rugby and I hope the refs will not be at centre stage like two weeks ago.
Oh, and before I go, a little recipe. No need for a sieve, but keep one handy, just in case you need to escape from Marcatraz (that’s what the French players nicknamed their rugby camp in Marcoussis, south of Paris).
The most famous omelette in France is served by La Mère Poulard restaurant (overrated and overpriced) in the Mont Saint Michel. It may not be the best omelette but it’s quite striking.
You’ll need 10 eggs.
2 table spoons of crème fraîche
40 g of butter
Salt, pepper
It will serve 4 people or a prop.
Save two eggs for the end.
Separate the yolks from the white. Whip the yolks lightly, but the whites ferociously with the salt. If by hand, at least several minutes, so they become almost solid.
Melt butter in a hot pan, add the yolks. When they begin to stick to the pan, add crème fraîche and the whipped whites. Do not stir. Make sure it does not stick too hard on the bottom. When ready, fold the omelet in two, so it looks like this:
Spray freshly ground pepper on top and serve immediately. Some in an upside down universe recommend Latour ‘82 with it, but it’s bollocks. I have yet to find a wine that goes well with eggs. Cider will be fine.
While you enjoy your first fluffed omelette, take the remaining eggs and throw them at my face when – if, he says tentatively? – my predictions, as usual, do not come true. As I said, I tried to keep this as short as possible.
As foretold by Flair99
Onna telly this week
Friday 12th March
| Zebre v Leinster | 17:45 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Bristol v Wasps | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
| Munster v Scarlets | 20:00 | S4C / Premier Sports 2 |
| Glasgow v Ospreys | 20:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
Saturday 13th March
| Newcastle v Bath | 12:30 | BT Sport Extra |
| Exeter v Harlequins | 12:30 | BT Sport Extra |
| Italy v Wales | 14:15 | ITV / S4C |
| Northampton v Sale | 14:45 | BT Sport Extra |
| Gloucester v Leicester | 15:00 | BT Sport Extra |
| England v France | 16:45 | ITV |
| Dragons v Ulster | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Connacht v Edinburgh | 19:35 | Premier Sports 2 |
Sunday 14th March
| Treviso v Cardiff Not-Blues | 13:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
| London Irish v Worcester | 13:00 | BT Sport 1 |
| Scotland v Ireland | 15:00 | BBC1 |
Ovally Balls 
@craigs
Really, I thought we’d give away a dumb penalty…
So I was impressed that once we were ahead with 90 secs left – we just left Scotland to it – tackles but no attempt to win the ball at the ruck – no chance to give away a pen to the corner etc etc – just waited for the inevitable knock on….
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Gibson-Park still kicking the ball away after you’d gone 3 points up at the end showed confidence in your defence. Or something.
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Well we would all have laughed ourselves silly if Poite had pinged Ireland for sealing off at one of their own rucks at the end and Scotland had scored. Best not to take that risk.
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Trisk – yeah, I think you showed more composure at the end.
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Scotland just needed Ireland’s bench to make more impact in those last few minutes.
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Have to agree with Ticht on the Healy thing. He was getting beasted, first penalty went his way wrongly, and then he got away without being penalised half a dozen times. Part of that is Poite, French referees in general, and more and more other refs just letting the ball get played whatever happens in the scrum. I think that is an improvement, tbh, but when a team is possibly going to get pushed off their own ball and they drop the scrum as a defensive/protective measure, it is harsh on the better scrum. Thought his assistant should have stepped in.
Turner should have been hooked earlier, and I thought price had a poor game. Hoggy looked OK at 10, Jones looked sharp when he came on. All in all, Scotlands game to lose, and they did.
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‘That said, Hamish Watson gets a nod from me.’
A full 45 degree chin to the chest job or just a slight cranial inclination?
It’s important we know.
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I just want to make sure the mish isn’t being short changed in the nod department.
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https://giphy.com/gifs/people-hd-gifsremastered-10Jpr9KSaXLchW
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Fuck
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It’s a freaky l, raised eyebrows, smiling nod.
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Stupid I.
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Really feel like chimpie and I are really adding to the quality of the conversation.
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Really?
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No more than usual.
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Thinking back on yesterday’s game and there aren’t a huge amount of pastries to be taken from that. Our lineout was pish. Our takes at the restart were pish. We were bossed at the breakdown. We gave away stupid penalties at stupid times. Finn had an off day. So basically it was like the bad old days when we used to get pumped by 30/40 points.
Yet Ireland needed a (very) late penalty to win. Not saying they didn’t deserve to win, they were clearly the better side for most of the game. But they only won by 3 points.
So I’m not TOO downhearted. Two defeats in two games, by a total of 4 points. Two games we could have and probably should have won. That last step is the biggest though.
And it would have been nice if the Graun had deigned to give us a talking point from the weekend’s games. But that doesn’t surprise me anymore about them.
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‘Finn had an off day.’
Difficult to have an on day as a 10 getting served up a small quantity of pish ball. He barely had front foot ball. Did a few good kicks, some decent passes. Missed penalty. I’d described it as mixed rather than off.
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I don’t know if anyone here follows Tony Collins “Rugby Reloaded” (maybe OT) – Collins’ is from a RL background but has some interesting stuff to say on development of RU – mainly that the need to get bums on seats (and have the ball in play more) means RU confronts the same problems that League has – albeit 100 years (or thereabouts) later. Doesn’t mean to say the solution has to be the same (eg lineouts were messy – RL got rid, RU allows lifting )
But based on that line of thinking – if the ball is playable, then play away – unless there’s any danger
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He scored a try too of course. He was definitely a victim of Scotland not winning enough of their own ball. However, the the missed kick at goal was one of those ones that came with the inevitability of Ireland scoring instead before halftime (not his fault I know) and the penalty he kicked felt big even though they would obviously have lost the lineout. There was also that break in the first half when he dithered about passing outside or in and ended up knocking on.
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@trisk
TomP has probably read more Tony Collins than me, to be fair.
I’ve not read what he’s wrote recently but that is exactly what happened. In the late 1890s the breakdown was an complete mess, so they moved to a scrum at every tackle. That took too long so they moved towards the play-the-ball by 1906 (which of course was related to a previous union rule anyway) as well as moving to 13 a side.
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(the penalty he kicked dead I mean)
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“they moved to a scrum at every tackle”
Union should definitely give this one a go.
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there’s film from 1902 or1903 where you see this – but it’s before the formalisation of positions – so basically 8 guys bind in any order
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‘Really feel like chimpie and I are really adding to the quality of the conversation.’
As ever craigs, as ever. The rest of this lot can only aspire to such lofty intellectual heights.
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25% lineout success yesterday apparently. don’t think I’ve ever seen a lineout that bad.
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Finn, Gray & Cummings likely out next week. Wonderful.
Hastings still banned
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it’s official, Cummings oot the squad. Rumour of fractured hand
Zandbags is back which is good. Although, to be fair Berghan did fine & exceeded my expecations
Interestingly Ally Miller gets a call up. Fair do’s. he’s been great for Embra of late. Obviously as a result he’s not wanted and is off to Glasgow.
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(You’ll beat Italy, Chimpie)
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An interesting thread
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@OT – yeah that’s the film I’m thinking of….
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“interesting”
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Good thread from the SB.
But I’ll say this: the virus doesn’t fucking care how good the cause is that you’re out protesting for. That applied to BLM, and it applies to women being safe on the streets. The Met, for once, have done the right thing imo.
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@Thaum – the women holding the vigil were all masked and social distancing, until the Met encircled them and forced them all together.
The organisers were also granted permission from the High Court to assemble, but the Met refused to meet with them, to sort out how to go about it all.
All in all, I lay *all* the blame for the weekend at the feet of the Met and Cressida Dick.
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It is highly unlikely the virus spreads outdoors. Even Patrick Vallance says so
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Yes, I know the chances of transmission are greatly reduced outdoors, but they’re not zero.
And they may have been social distancing at the protest itself, but presumably many travelled on public transport to get there.
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Basically, I think you have to be a bit of a dick to decide to go on a physical demo at the moment. (And women’s safety is an issue I obviously feel very strongly about.) Write to your MP. Organise on-line protests, such as, I dunno, coordinated tweet attacks on the Home Office. But do not put everyone’s health at risk.
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Thinking about that, I seem to recall that roughly one million people protested in London alone against the Iraq War – to fuck-all effect. How many of those people bothered to write to their MPs? I’m willing to bet that would have got more attention, as it would have caused massive headaches for MPs.
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Thaum – putting on my tin foil hat ever so slightly; do you not get a feeling that covid laws are being used to enact permanent changes to protest and other laws?
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Craigs – yes, that aspect does worry me. And I also think that the arseholes who have decided to go out and protest in the middle of a pandemic have given them the cover they need to do this.
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Protests and demonstrations have to be thought through very carefully at the moment. I support the right to protest 100%, but it can’t be at the risk of new spikes or stretching the already stretched public services any further. I obviously say this from afar with regards to the UK, but I think it’s fair to say that most public health and safety systems are creaking already, both physically and emotionally. That said, governments can’t be allowed to try to stifle genuine grievances by hiding behind Covid – as too many do.
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These are the lads that introduced legislation cos they wanted to crack down on people listening to “repetitive beats”. They’re not hiding behind Covid because they’d do it anyway.
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“They’re not hiding behind Covid because they’d do it anyway.”
They are hiding behind Covid, but they would do it anyway.
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I think the chances of anyone spreading Covid at the vigil on Saturday were pretty much nil. Using ‘the virus’ as some kind of bogey man doesn’t wash with me. I am genuinely worried now that the UK is drifting towards a more permanent form of authoritarianism
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CMW, thst’s probably more accurate.
At least the statues are safe.
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Are the statues socially distanced?
Agreed with pretty much everything above, in that I don’t think there’s a one-size-fits-all answer to the issue. If we need to practice social distancing in everyday situations, protests shouldn’t be any different, but at the same time, cracking down on events that paint the elite in a bad light is unacceptable. As ever, some kind of balance needs to be achieved (and I believe that the march that kicked this off was adhering to regulations) and importantly, in a post-Covid world, there can be no fuzzing of issues.
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@DeeBee – arrest and fine the organisers, leave everyone else alone. And stop fetishising bloody statues!!
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CJ Stander retired!!!
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Tomp – my brother made me go to a 4 day techno festival for his stag do so banning repetitive beats seems attractive in that context.
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