Can you feel it? That frisson in the air? No, it’s not fucking Phil Collins! (Don’t be an idiot.) Kick off your high-heeled stud boots; it’s party time. SIX NATIONS OPENING WEEKEND! WOOHOO!
The delectable anticipation, the raw hunger, the beautiful dream as yet undisturbed by some snot-nosed kids bringing your blissful reverie to a sudden and brutal end.
First up on the menu is a tasty treat in the form of a re-Gatted Wales against a McCloskey-powered Ireland. Roof is to be closed in Cardiff, apparently. Ominous.
Next up is England v Scotland. Can Scotland be Karl-like and pull it off again at Twickenham?
Finally, on Sunday, we have Italy v France. It would be surprising if Italy won, but could home advantage and perhaps a ref decision or two produce some drama?
So sit back and enjoy the anticipation! By the end of the weekend, half of us will be asking ¿Qué bandolera que eres tú?
Onna telly this week
Friday 3rd February
| Wales v Ireland (U20s) | 19:00 | BBC iPlayer / S4C |
| England v Scotland (U20s) | 19:00 | BBC iPlayer / RTÉ Player |
| Italy v France (U20s) | 20:00 | BBC iPlayer |
Saturday 4th February
| Sharks v Stormers | 12:00 | Viaplay Sports 2 / TG4 |
| Toulouse v Bayonne | 14:00 | Viaplay Sports 2 |
| Wales v Ireland | 14:15 | BBC1 / S4C |
| La Rochelle v Lyon | 16:00 | Viaplay Sports 2 |
| England v Scotland | 16:45 | ITV1 / RTÉ2 |
| Montpellier v Toulon | 20:00 | Viaplay Sports 2 |
Sunday 5th February
| Italy v France | 15:00 | ITV1 |
| Stade Français v Bordeaux | 20:00 | Viaplay Sports 2 |
Falir, I concur.
Slade, I thought Smith did pretty well, considering. Often when he took the ball himself it was because there were no other options, the Scottish defence was excellent. There was a period just before half time and just after that England looked fantastic.
Farrell was directly responsible for the hole that Jones went thru for the first try, he stood and watched Duhan run past him for his first, leaving Marchant who was marking the man outside him to come of his man and grasp at thin air, and for Duhans second he was inside Smith who was the last man, and should have covered the inside step. He didn’t even make a flap. Either way, both Smith and Farrell tackle like tens, ie a bit hit or miss. No one 10 has tackled like Johnny as consistently since he retired. In the first 30 minutes of the game Farrell was absolutely non existant, no tackles , no runs, no clearing out, at least Smith gives that go when he is there and it is needed. It has struck my mind that perhaps Faz is protecting an injury ? If not, what is he playing at ?
LikeLike
Slade, it was said all week, or at least after the team was published, that England would play a lot of the game in the air. They were supposed to have a very strong kick chase to hoover up any dropped balls.
In fact England kicked well and found grass a lot of the time, they won the territory battle hands down, our tries were all long range efforts bar White’s which came from a mistake at the ruck
LikeLiked by 2 people
If I was Italian, I would be miffed not to get a penalty at that first scrum.
LikeLike
Oops. Charge down, first try France.
LikeLike
arse.
LikeLike
Disaster for Italy there!
LikeLike
Oh! Italy lucky, rather.
LikeLike
CAPUOZZO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
LikeLike
Great try
LikeLike
Lovely try!
LikeLike
Well played Italy. Amazing they are still in it. Tomasso has really gone up a notch since he has been at Quins.
LikeLike
Well he’s certainly been the best Quins fly half on display this weekend…
LikeLiked by 1 person
As usual. France are rusty and impatient for their first game. 3 opportunistic tries but not much else to show, except poor handling and so many unnecessary penalties . Galthié will be fuming.
LikeLike
Italy lead going into the final quarter!
LikeLike
Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.
LikeLike
Not now they don’t.
LikeLike
Well! I certainly didn’t think this would come down to a last-play thriller. Massive performance by Italy. France’s indiscipline nearly did for them.
LikeLike
So how aften will Italy feel hard done by in defeat to France? So unlucky, but Allan was a bit too scared with his kicks to touch at the end.
LikeLike
Ooh, harsh by Mr. Carley. Well played Italy. Great entertainment by both sides. Wooden spoon for England ?
LikeLike
On current evidence, Allan is a better international game manager #10 than Smith – he also plays well for Quins.
If Italy had played a decent #9 in the first half they would likely have won – he was the source of most of their errors.
Again, unnecessary errors cost the game.
LikeLike
Ticht
Kick chase is a poor primary tactic, even if you are supposed to be good at it. At international level England are not great at it, it’s a 50/50 thing and to cap it, England’s kicking was not good enough for international level.
LikeLike
SBT
I suspect you are right but behind all this, Farrell is #10 for Saracens, far and away the best team in England and in that team he is ruthless.
Smith plays for Quins, with two big and smart runners (Dombrandt and Esterhuizen) alongside plus electric backs. This formula does not exist for Borthwick at the moment.
LikeLike
Anyway, as a neutral, I enjoyed today’s game
LikeLike
So will Italy be targetting wins against Wales and England this year?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Phew… talk about a get out of jail card…
So many penalties conceded! So many big names not at the races, from Ollivon to Alldritt. Thank dog for Fickou and Dupont.
Galthié had an interesting thing to say at HT. He asked his players to completely stop contesting rucks as they couldn’t adjust to the ref interpretation. Thus it basically negated France’s main strength: turn overs followed by broken play.
Funny how France always look less motivated vs Italy than vs the home nations or the SH. Almost as if they thought they could just show up and walk away easy winners without sweating.
That said, Italy could expect to win again vs Wales and why not vs England. Still too many handling errors but their backs moves will trouble other teams. Forza Azzuri!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Crikey I’m going to put a tenner on Italy to get their first win over England next week!
LikeLike
Re. Fax’s awful defending yesterday: Could it be that tackle school has messed with his head?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Maybe Finn was just belatedly thanking Owen for that nice intercept pass 4 years ago? Seriously, did England think roughing up Finn was going to be a way to win, or did Farrell come up with that himself. Either way, it didnae work. If he can’t take it, don’t dish it out.
LikeLike
Ya bass!
LikeLiked by 9 people
Back at ya!
LikeLike
Watched the whole England-Scotland match last night, having missed most of it live. A lot of pretty aimless kicking, as opposed to hoofing it to enable a contest. McDuhan’s tries were brilliant – the first showing great spatial awareness and once he’d roared past the first couple of defenders and into open space, he was dictating to the defence where they would be, rather than them being able to organise; the second, well what can you say? great team effort, but again, the strength and balance to finish were superb.
I’ve often said that for me, Jonah Lomu’s greatness was not simply about his unbelievable size, strength and speed, but that he had a superb step and change of pace as well, which allowed him to get the tackler off balance and thus not properly set for the tackle, allowing Lomu to break tackles more easily.* I’m not saying VdM is Lomu class, but his stepping is as much a part of his ability to get the tackler off balance as his size and pace are.
* Mike Catt wishes he could use this excuse!
LikeLike
Hey hey, El Suavo back on the pages!
I only half watched yesterday’s game as the central heating decided to pack in – there isn’t a lot of consumer-serviceable parts to a boiler, once you’ve tried turning it off and on, check there is still hot water and change the batteries in the controller, you’ve pretty much exhausted what you can do without the training and a gas safety certificate.
Maybe I’m over-selling him because I’m a fan, but France miss a lot of go-forward without Danty.
France looked clunky, they could, and should, have put the game to bed by the half hour mark, they will get better. Italy made a lot of errors themselves, not least from the kicking tee and out of hand.
Ireland looked like they took their foot off the gas after an imperious first 30 minutes, was that just Ireland relaxing a bit or did Wales have a big say in that? I think the latter.
England didn’t get the new coach bounce they wanted, there are a good few senior players for them who are not performing at the level we’ve seen from them – Farrell and Itoje in particular.
I don’t think I’ve seen a Scottish lineout go something like 120% – all of our own ball plus stealing one or two of the opposition throws, and certainly not at Twickenham.
I have a grumble about the ref, that goes without saying, in an otherwise good performance he was conned by the England props a couple of times – Genge had the character “–” on his back, so squint was his line of drive, Cole popped up out of the scrum and was rewarded for it.
Scotland have never beaten a Gatland-coached Wales, next week is going to be huge for us. One because of the record against Gatland, two because while we’ve been capable of pulling out decent one-off performances, we’ve never backed it up. My feeling is that is mainly down to the fabled top two inches, we really have to turn up and play well next week or the Calcutta Cup game means nothing.
Wales will be hunting for a good scalp and a top performance themselves.
Next weekend could well be the round of the Championship, Ireland France will probably be the title decider, Scotland Wales is going to be a highly intense test match. Italy will be fancying a crack at England
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think Ireland for the GS, France and Scotland vying for 2nd and third spot, England, Wales and Italy for the last three.
France are not where they were last year. Missing too many important players (Mauvaka, Woki, Danty and Villière in particular) and with half a dozen more out of shape or just returning from injury (Willemse, Ollivon, Cros). They were clunky and a bit fortunate last november, and they still are. Italy gave them a scare to the point that Dupont remained on the pitch until the end, Galthié being probably afraid to give his first cap to inexperienced Le Garrec.
All this point to an easy win for Ireland, and that’s not what I expected to say before the Italy game.
Scotland to win vs Wales and England vs Italy.
LikeLike
@Ticht – I have a grumble about the video ref – that last try should have been chalked off for a forward pass. Would have gone back for the penalty, Scotland probably would have come away with points and the lead (and were worthy winners overall, no arguments about that) but it was blatantly forward out of hands.
LikeLike
I thought the ref was quite harsh on the Saffer front row, but let our wings get away with a bit in terms of forward passing.No complaints from me about the reffing.
Overall, a fabulous weekend of Test rugby! Yip, Ireland did what most expected, at least in the 1st half, but Wales did put up a decent showing in the 2nd. The other two matches were great contests for the neutral, loved every minute of the games (until France scored the winner, apologies in advance, Flair). Not always excellent rugby, but few matches produce that throughout, but loads of drama, nail-biting and screaming at the TV. Even for neutrals. This weekend should be a cracker as well, with all three matches in the balance.
LikeLike
Dab, there is spider cam footage here, hopeful this will go to the time stamp at 1:25:55
I thought it looked flat out the hands from that angle
LikeLike
In fact I should have let it run, the reverse angle after the spider cam shows it even better, it’s not forward
LikeLike
“the Saffer front row, but let our wings get away ”
Rugby at the top level is no longer a pastime, although watching it still is. Playing at the elite level is a job, a career, there’s no putting the genie back in the bottle.
Some of the Southern Hemisphere players may have come north for work and travel opportunities if the game was still amateur, it’s not exactly a new phenomenon – go to Pamplona, the Greek Islands and Munich over the course of the summer/Autumn and it’s pretty obvious that tourism from NZ, SA and Oz is still strong. Go to a bar around London’s Kings Cross and you’ll be greeted with SH accents more often than not.
Just taking the Scotland team, would Steyn, Schoeman, Nel and van der Merwe be playing international rugby if they hadn’t come to Edinburgh or Glasgow?
Probably not, Nel was going to give up after the Cheetahs, Duhan was badly injured and out of contract, is Steyn going to oust any of the SA wings?
Schooey may have got a chance, maybe.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ha! Apparently Scotland are now up to 5th in the World Rankings, that means our RWC group currently have the teams ranked 5th, 4th and 1st.
LikeLike
Can always rely on you to take the bait, Ticht! Mission accomplished!
Don’t think any of them was/would be realistically in with a shout at Bok honours at the moment, barring catastrophic injury lists. It will be interesting to see, in a couple of years of earning in pounds and euros, if the SA franchises are able to hold onto fringe internationals or those who think they probably won’t get a shot at the Boks. The Lions could certainly do with the likes of those playing for Scotland (even Henry Immelman, probably), not to mention the dozens of current and former Boks playing in Europe and Japan. Think we may be able to produce a couple of handy sides if we still had those guys here. But at 21 to the pound, it’s not likely without going the private equity route. Perish the thought.
LikeLike
To be honest Deebee, it gets a bit tiresome this same thing, year after year.
Scotland seem to be singled out for it more than most. No one says Marcus Smith should be playing for the Philippines
LikeLike
Henry Immelman has been very good at Edinburgh after a slowish start, he’s off the the Bulls next season.
LikeLike
Ticht, if you’re looking for a TH to replace WP Nel, Neethling Fouche at the Stormers is quietly wrecking opponents down here. Learned his trade from Frans Malherbe, and at 30, probably only has a season or so to get into a pretty congested Bok set up. Fouche, Joseph Dweba (Top14 discard) and Brok Harris (older than ole man Nel himself) pasted the Sharks front row on Saturday with Kitshoff and Malherbe rested.
LikeLike
I fancy Marcus Smith should be playing for the Philippines, by the way, not sure what anybody else thinks?
LikeLike
Ticht, Scotland are probably getting singled out at the moment because you’ve got some high-performing guys in the side from here. It was only 10 or 12 years ago that about half the England (and Wales) cricket side was born in SA, some having moved to the UK young, others in early adulthood, KP at 23, approaching adolescence.
LikeLike
Apparently Edinburgh were going have a chat with Carlu Sadie when he was up playing for the Sharks the other week
LikeLike
Dab, it was no more forward than Ludlams pass to Malins. Not sure I get the love for Malins for that game, he strikes me as a bit wafferty in defence, and anyone could have scored his two tries yesterday, the first one was a bit borderline on the grounding, I thought, as well.
Still in the golf club bar, Suavo ?
LikeLike
@sbt
I agree about his tries, although catching the first one took
great skill. He’s not really a winger as such apparently, more of a creator to complement the 10, so his selection on Saturday surprised me considering England had Smith and Faz on the field.
LikeLiked by 1 person
@Ticht – it was the spidercam angle that really confirmed it as a forward pass for me (freeze the vid at 1:25:59 and look where the ball is)… But good point from SBT about Ludlam’s pass – looked perfectly flat to my one eye, but looking carefully at the replay (on the vid freeze it at 39:35), it’s also forward.
I also thought Malins was sus in defence, and Steward. Steward offers so little in attack that if he’s not munching his man in the tackle every time like Halfpenny used to, he has no business being there.
LikeLiked by 1 person
@dab
The refs don’t really look at the trajectory of the ball anymore I believe. The deciding factor appears to be the direction the hands are facing when the pass is made. The Scottish lad’s hands (freeze it at 1:26:08) appears to be flat or backwards so it would be reasonable to assume it was ok.
Ludlam’s hands at 39:26 look ok as well.
LikeLiked by 1 person