Back to bad old days for the Springboks, being excluded from a tournament when we all know they’d have cakewalked it without raising a sweat. A bit like the World Cup and Lions tour. So easy was it that our Director of Rugby took to making videos to help the refs and carrying water onto the pitch for the boys to have a wee sip whilst the opposition lay scattered to the four corners. Anyway, not much we can do about this latest iniquity, so let’s have a look at the dross on display and see if we can squeeze a modicum of excitement out of the Six Nations: Greatest Show on Earth™.
France to Prance! Two silver medals (and nobody ripping them off their necks, I note) in the last two editions suggests that the combination of Galthié, Edwards and the growing presence of Dupont and Ntamack behind a typically rugged French pack should see them press for the whole thing this time around. France showed in taking a virtually third-string side to Australia in 2021 and then stuffing the All Blacks up their holes that they’re both good enough and have the depth to cope with the inevitable injuries and – dog forbid – Covid disruptions plaguing modern sport. France ease into the tournament with Italy at home, dusting off the cobwebs before playing possibly the defining match of the tournament a week later, at home to Ireland. Win those two and the French are fair set for another second-place finish behind the Boks.
Ireland are Firing! Probably the most consistent side of the last couple of years and with quality in most key positions, the Irish are many pundits’ favourites for the whole thing. Like France, they stuffed the Kiwis in the Autumn Internationals, to throw down a gauntlet to the rugby world this year. Ireland have quality across the park, with the one question being the increasingly age-old questions of whether the half back pair of Connor Murray and Johnny Sexton are up for another season. There’s plenty of depth behind those two, and with some scintillating outside backs emerging from the bogs, allied to one of the toughest, best loose trios out there, Ireland really could rip up a few trees this time out. Home to Wales first up, and a likely win (it’s been almost a decade since one of these sides won away), it’s then off to Paris for a potential Championship decider – should be a cracker. With a convenient breather after those two against Italy, it’s then away to an England who could be in disarray or eyeing a Grand Slam, before a potential last week banana skin against the ever-improving, continually disappointing Scots. Ireland to contest fiercely for that coveted second place behind the Boks.
Brave Scots or Bon Mots? Difficult to tell, really. With Finn Russell as skipper of the good ship Scotland you’re as likely to roar through the Strait of Messina giving two fingers to each of Scylla and Charybdis as you are wrecking yourself on the Thames tide. Scotland’s pack is now steady enough in the set piece (mostly) and has some fine, tearaway loose forwards in the best traditions of Scottish sides of yesteryear, to complement their back division. Get some decent front foot ball and this side can do serious damage. Eight B&I Lions last year, and only Ireland more consistent in the 6N in terms of wins in the last few years should see this Scots side bristling with confidence – and yet, is the self-belief there? They’ll not be lacking in motivation for the visit of England in round one, and a visit to Cardiff to face a potentially battered and bruised Wales could set them up for a glorious tilt at the whole shebang. They host favourites France after the break with the loser of that match surely consigned to the also-rans bin and can empty the tank on that one, with a break before travelling to Italy to come and then the other favourites, Ireland on the last weekend. If Scotland can navigate a way past the Scylla of France and Charybdis of Ireland, glory awaits! But it’s a long tournament and disruptions won’t be papered over easily with a callow pool to pick from. Out of the medals, with France and Ireland scrapping for the minor placings behind the mighty Boks.
Mojo or Bojo? Let’s face it, with Eddie ‘Rasputin was an amateur’ Jones calling the shots, you’re never really sure whether the chariot will swing, low, sweetly or at all. Plans have been disrupted by the loss of captain and talisman Owen Farrell, his replacement Courtney Lawes along with both first-choice wings and Manu ‘part-timer’ Tuilagi for the initial stages at least, means a disrupted backline held together by, er, Ben Youngs. On paper that looks horrible. Actually it looks horrible all round, but England beat both Australia and the Boks (how, nobody knows) in November so will have some cause for optimism. Young Marcus at 10 and Freddie Steward at 15 give England some fabulous attacking options though, behind a pack that whilst disrupted, seldom takes a backward step – and surely won’t do against Scotland first up. That said, it’s been lean pickings against the Scots in recent times, who have some class of their own. Away to Scotland is perilous against this backdrop of disruption, especially with a full Murrayfield and England will do well to host Italy with their personnel and faculties intact. Hosting Wales and Ireland before travelling to France is a bridge too far for this side. Perhaps Bojo the Slippery will come to the rescue by declaring war on France for not declaring war on Russia for not invading Ukraine? Either way, tussling with Scotland and Wales for the rights to look down on Italy.
Wales, beached or bubbling? Reigning Champions after a remarkable 2021 campaign, helped along nicely by the inability of opponents to keep all fifteen on the field for much of it, should see the Welsh with a decent shout this year. But the loss of AWJ, George North, Leigh Halfpenny, Ken Owens, Josh Navidi, Justin Tipuric and Taulupe Faletau is huge in terms of experience and ability. Dan Biggar gets his chance to wave his arms at the ref as actual skipper this year and has some great runners outside of him in LRZ, Josh Adams and Liam Williams and Lions nine Gareth Davies to steady things behind the scrum. The forwards will be well served by Lions loosehead Wyn Jones and tighthead Tomas Francis, but may be light between them, whilst the second row looks ‘orrible without AWJ – but Beard and Co will just about cope. Backs to the wall, the trip to Dublin could be a feisty affair, probably a loss, with Scotland then arriving in Cardiff to further torment Wales. A trip to London before hosting France may well see Wales looking at the Italy clash as their only win.
Italy: Ethiopia thrashed them twice: It may have been 90-odd years ago, but it seems about that long since the debate around their participation in the 6 Nations started. Lots of hype around how their junior sides are doing, how Benetton deservedly won whatever trophy it was during lockdown, how they’re producing a few decent players and are on an upward trajectory, but let’s face it, there’s more likelihood of the wolf actually suckling Romulus and Remus than this lot winning a match this season. And unlike the Colosseum, there’s little glorious or inspiring about the wreck that is Italian rugby. It’s a good thing you stir boiling water with a wooden spoon, because at least this squad will have plenty to choose from to make a plate of pasta. They’ll be competitive for bits and bobs in some matches, but really, Georgia would be a better bet, as we all know.
Springboks to Cruise it! Obviously leaving the best for last, so you can all savour that stunning last morsel, sated at the end by the power, subtlety, grace and deftness of the cornucopia of delights put on offer by the Boks, and washed down with crystal pure water served by the humble Waterboy himself. Can’t go into too much detail though because curiously the squad and fixtures don’t seem to be up anywhere. Doesn’t matter: five away matches, five wins, five bonus points and rightfully scratching New Zealand and Australia off Bill in 87 and 91 as an added bonus. Easy peasy. Siya Kolisi named player of the tournament, player of the year, new United Nations Secretary General and Commander of Space for Humanity.
You’ll be astounded to learn that this was the work of Deebee7.
Further Reading
Don’t miss BK’s fabulous graph of xenophobes v poachers.
Anyone who fancies a good old discussion about who should wear the 12 shirt for England can go here.
Onna telly this week
Friday 4th February
| Gloucester v London Irish | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
| France U20 v Italy U20 | 20:00 | BBC iPlayer |
| Ireland U20 v Wales U20 | 20:00 | BBC iPlayer / S4C / RTÉ2 |
| Scotland U20 v England U20 | 20:00 | BBC iPlayer |
| Ulster v Connacht | 20:15 | BBC2 NI / TG4 / Premier Sports 1 |
Saturday 5th February
| Bulls v Lions | 13:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Ireland v Wales | 14:15 | S4C / ITV / RTÉ2 |
| Stormers v Sharks | 15:05 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Scotland v England | 16:45 | BBC1 |
| Toulon v Castres | 20:00 | Premier Sports 2 |
Sunday 6th February
| Harlequins v Sale | 13:00 | BT Sport 1 | ||
| France v Italy | 15:00 | ITV / RTÉ2 | ||
| Biarritz v La Rochelle | 17:30 | Premier Sports 1 | ||
| Clermont v Bordeaux | 20:00 | Premier Sports 1 |
Ovally Balls 
Who is the 19 for Sale? Towers over Lood de Jager!
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Thumping win for Sale at Quins. 14-36 the final score. First time I’ve seen Faf this season and he has some sublime touches. Which he was allowed to do that in a Bok jersey.
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France by how many? 35? 40?
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That was balletic.
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Deebs – I would have said 50, but they amazingly haven’t scored yet!
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DeeBee, I think it’s JP du Preez. There were a lot of them on the pitch today…
A very pleasing win over a(n albeit) much depleted Quins. Helps when you have Faf, Manu and Bevan Todd come off the bench, but the starting 15 had been impressive before that. Roebuck is another of the fine young wings in the Premiership, and Raffi Quirke is very impressive. Surprised he was dropped from the England squad, but I don’t think it will be long before he’s back.
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That could be interesting if he stayed in play!
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Italy already looking loads better than last year
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Ooh, quick thinking by Italy a score by the width of a blade of grass.
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Helluva finish
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Mid-table URC side all over France. Garbisi better at cross-field kicks than Smith.
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Damn fine conversion, too.
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France playing like South Africa, trying to blast and then kick.
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Oops
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Self-generated roll is a term I like.
Another Welsh lad having a bad time of it. Good play by Jellonch.
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Can you imagine if Youngs played at the speed of Dupont? *stares wistfully into the distance*
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Oops. Poor play from the Italy 9.
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To be fair to Youngs, Refit, he’s about 64 years old. On the other hand, plenty of years left in him yet.
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I didn’t think youngs was so bad yesterday. Break or two, put Smith in.
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Great try by France. Strong maul and then brilliant passing.
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Exactly, Chimpie. Give him time to build a partnership with Smith.
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Brooker! Lovely to see you here! That’s a du Preez u don’t know! Italy were decent enough in that half, just sense France haven’t hit their straps yet.
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Is Dupont impersonating Youngs? I’ve rarely see him dither that much in a game. Good try just before HT, the rest was painful to watch. It certainly pours down with rain in Paris, but that didn’t bother Ireland yesterday.
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French sub warming up in the half-time break:
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Italy are putting pressure on him, as you’d expect, but some poor choices at times with the kicking.
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Clever play to use Danty as a blocker.
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A shade unlucky.
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Frustrating for Italy. Garbisi didn’t need to take the quick penalty. Aldritt taking Dupont out of the game.
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Hi Deebee!
We were quadupreezed today … JP, JL, D and R.
On the other hand, we were completely uncurried, as twin 1 was Englanding and twin 2 injured.
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So THAT France have finally turned up! Lovely try.
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Well played for France, but also a good showing from Italy, in the grand scheme of things.
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A bit meh.
Apart from a couple of good tries, not a game I’ll remember. Tactics were spot on, kicking and mauls, rinse and repeat until some (excellent) counter rucking delivers quick ball, but it wasn’tpretty. Ntamack and Dupont were very quiet, the penalty count far too high (nothing to do with Adamson for once), let’s just hope that rust will disappear before next Saturday.
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Were France 27 points better than Italy? Yes. Were Italy 27 points worse than France? No. Sounds strange but with a bit of luck and the odd bit of composure, Italy could’ve been closer. France probably should’ve put the game to bed earlier though. They’ll need to up the intensity considerably next week, when the we have the last two sides to beat the All Blacks squaring off! Should be good!
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Nice to ITV having ‘best-selling’* author James Hook in the studio.
*Best-selling in parts of Wales, probably. Or two schools in Glasgow.
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@BB leave Hooky alone. He’s a nice lad.
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He is. And I bought his two books for my libraries (and one’s already been borrowed!). And most of the ‘This is brilliant, read this book’ plugs come from his Welsh national team colleagues. And Greig Laidlaw.
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Maybe if Matt Williams knew the laws of the game better, he would have been a better head coach for Scotland?
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Was the Rob there Rob Kearney? How can these people get commentary gigs if they don’t know the laws of the sport they are talking about?
Matt Williams is a bluffer, absolutely the worst coach Scotland have ever had, imo.
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I watched the game on the BBC and don’t bother much watching the punditry but Kearney’s on the Virgin Media pundit team so it probably was him.
Not only was it a penalty try but it was very funny. A bit like Cuthbert’s volleyball smash v Australia in the 2015 RWC.
Very impressed by Russell’s crossfield kicks. That try was reminiscent of the Springbok-Scotland game in the autumn. As was quite a lot of the game, except for South Africa having a better scrum than England and more of an attacking threat in the backs.
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@flair
I don’t yet have the tickets to hand – deadline for paying is today. I thought I had a sale to a Paris-based colleague but ‘maman’ is arriving from La Réunion at the weekend, so I’m back to square 1.
so, if you reckon you can find takers – pretty sure Thauma can connect us by email or WhatsApp, and we can see how we go from there
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OT, is this one for Schrodinger?
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@tomp
Not really a good example of Schrodingers Cat paradox. That occurs when a single electron (or similar) exists in a superposition of two or more possible states. It’s quite plain to see there are two discrete rugby balls on the pitch in that situation.
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Well, Kearney has media presence / recognition and is distant cousin of Biden – so he’s a “name”. I didn’t catch what Kearney said but I did hear Williams claiming it was unfair or something…. which was ridiculous. The only mitigation might have been Graham’s jump.
At a local level, we had 6 youth games at the weekend. U18 girls had their 1st formal run out ina 12-a-side comp and won 29-27 over Bantry. U16 girls had a win over combined Dolphin-Midleton-Youghal team.
U16 boys lost to Bruff 22-5 – first defeat in the comp (number one son returned at 9 to play full game). U18 boys also lost at same venue.
U14 A team beat local rivals Castleisland 10-5 (number 2 son scored a try) on Saturday. Our B team were
short on numbers for their Sunday game but rather than cancel the game – I agreed with the opposition to concede and play a friendly and add in a few of our A team. Everyone gets to play in a competitive match and to hell with the trophies.
Our friendly was reffed by a fully qualified ref – quite useful to have that from time to time. He reversed one penalty for kicking the ball at an opponent and put us back 10 for some yap. But took the time to explain what and why – which (I think) was appreciated.
Number 2 son also scored in the friendly and probably had a second – I was running the line and I’m about 75% sure he got the ball down in the corner before being pushed into touch-in-goal. But with no TMO or slo-mo …. really difficult to see for sure – ref looked at me and I indicated I wasn’t sure. We won in the end, but it was a tight game and I didn’t want me giving a try for my son to be the key score…. I might have taken a different view if it was 30-0….
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Looking at the domestic calendar, Edinburgh are in Dublin on Friday night. Leinster have just the 16 players in the Ireland squad and such is their quality all of them will be in or around the match day squad, so I can’t see any of them being released to play in this fixture.
Likewise Edinburgh’s dozen will not be released, so it’s a question of relative squad depth.
Hrmmm. A pumping for Edinburgh it is, then.
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We’ll be stuffed, ticht. Up our holes.
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Well, without their internationals Leinster have struggled a bit – lost to Cardiff a fortnight ago, got beaten by the Ospreys last season. However, a number of experienced players’ll be there – Toner, Treacy/Cronin, Ruddock in the pack – and some nice young backs. Dodgy half back in Luke McGrath, mind. I think Edinburgh have got a shot but know very little about their second-string.
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“Dolphin-Midleton-Youghal”
That’s a weird old mix. Youghal’s about 30 miles from Cork (where Dolphin are from for those that don’t know).
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Yeah – trying to get girls rugby up and running does make for some odd bedfellows in terms of generating sufficient numbers.
It was suggested we combine with Bantry Bay RFC for U18s – close enough as the crow flies but you’ve the Cork and Kerry mountains (“…as I was going over…”) in the way – it’d be impossible to train in evenings as you’re looking at 90mins either way. Nasty old drive on a cold, wet winter evening – in terms of logistics you’d want to leave at 5pm for a 7pm training session and not get home till 10pm or later.
Anyway, we’ve 12 now in the U18 training group – and they’ll be bolstered by a lot of our large U16 group next season. Issue is to ensure the pipeline exists behind to keep decent sized U14s and U16s panels.
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Embra are struggling for tightheads, we signed Jake Armstrong from Bristol on a short term deal last week. We still have Venter on the other side and he looks good. Ben Toolis, Bill Mata, Luan de Bruin, Luke Crosbie, Damien Holland, James Lang, Bill Mata and Romiro Moyano were all injured for the trip to Ospreys, with the 12 with Scotland that’s 20 players all of whom would be in or around our match day 23. I think there is an injury or two more to the other tightheads we have
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Bill Mata got injured twice, obviously
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