RBS Six Nations 2007

Aw poor Jamie, I'm not sure what to say ..

How about

quote:

Originally posted by JamieWednesday:
Ah hahhahahhhaaahhhahhha

Ha

Ha

My wife (who I love dearly) is a Jock.

Ha

hahahahahahahahahahaahahahahaha

Ian

Well the long feared thumping has been realised. Ireland are simply a better team and better player for player in almost every department.

I actually think that England showed some signs that they are a better team than they were in the Autumn. But Ireland on form are second in the world only to the All Blacks and they should have beaten France two weeks ago.

Congratulations to Ireland for a stunning performance.

Mark

We were thumped.

But we were thumped by the favourites at their impressive new home.

The Jocks were thumped. At home. By the perennial wooden spooners to date.

Give us time. I'm sure we'll reach the level of the Hibernians once more.

Men against boys. Well done Ireland, terrific performance. I'm sure that England will improve but not any time soon I fear.

Steve

Six Nations resumes this weekend and England are without Wilko and Raging Bull and Mike Catt gets a recall. Other than that it is a very young/experimental team again and could be on the end of another thrashing. I still think they are going in the right direction though, and will be a force again in 2 or 3 years time. Too late for this world cup, I think.

Mark

Many congratulations to the Irish on their Triple Crown. Head and shoulders the best of the 'home' nations and Italy - and, but for the momentary lapse of reason at the end, I think bested France too.

Whether they can repeat this over the Southern Hemisphere, though, I'm not so sure...

Scotland ran them mightily close, though. And what happened at the end of the Wales v Italy game? That was a bit odd to say the least and the Welsh have good reason to feel hard done-by. Still, congratulations to Italy for another Six Nations win. They are far from the whipping-boys of past years.

Mark

Not a bad game at Twickers then today, eh chaps?

Well where did that performance come from? There will be a lot of talk about how France didn't turn up, but as Ireland did to England last time, the England pack did not let France play. In fact had they been a little more precise with their passing they may have won by more. Strettle, Flood, Palmer, Rees and Geraghty all put down markers for themselves and old man Catty brought a bit of composure to proceedings in midfield.

It's just a beginning but if England can use this as a springboard to improve further they could perform better than expected in the world cup. They still won't be serious contenders I think, but at least might put up a reasonable fight.

Mark

Great game, had a ball at the game today - perhaps the low expectations helped. But great to see a performance of character after such a capitulation in Dublin.

Steve.

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

It's just a beginning but if England can use this as a springboard to improve further they could perform better than expected in the world cup. They still won't be serious contenders I think, but at least might put up a reasonable fight.

Mark

Didn't the English win the last World Cup or something? What could have happened in a few years to cause you to lose so much faith in the team?

quote:

Originally posted by JWM:
Many congratulations to the Irish on their Triple Crown. Head and shoulders the best of the 'home' nations and Italy

Absolute tosh! Ireland lost to France and scraped by Scotland. The best you can say is that they were the floating turds in the pool!!

Just three good performances in the whole Six Nations so far. France over Italy, Ireland over England and today England over France.

Makes for a much more interesting competition though. But if you think Ireland are "head and shoulders the best" then I surmise that you are a kissball supporter and know not a lot about egg chasing... !!

Duncan

quote:

Didn't the English win the last World Cup or something? What could have happened in a few years to cause you to lose so much faith in the team?

Deane,

I think the person posting the comment above was being realistic. The England team pre the last world cup would have ground out a win against the irish whilst not playing their best.

The word you are looking for is that which all teams aspire to - consistency....

Did England win by actually playing some Rugby yesterday-or did I just hallucinate? I've never seen so many offloads by an English team. Lots of errors too but the back row added some pace, the reccyling was faster and Corry looked happier in the second row. I too reckon they are a long way short of being contenders for the WC though. Ellis in particular fails to convince me that he is anything but a journeyman.

So how would you pick a centre pair from Wilko/Flood/Farrell and Catt? Methinks if all fit they'd go Wilko/Catt but that would be harsh on Flood. Farrell has been exposed at this level but I'll wager he gets given another go since the RFU have invested so much in him.

Has to be said that I can rarely recall a more lethargic France. Did somebody spike their food overnight? Bizarre, especially seeing as the Grand Slam was at stake.

As for Ireland, they seem to have gone backwards again, Scotland may have been downright awkward (and dirty too perhaps) but they made Ireland look nervous and disjointed.

Nobody in New Zealand (or the Southern Hemisphere in general) is quaking about any of these sides.

Bruce

quote:

Nobody in New Zealand (or the Southern Hemisphere in general) is quaking about any of these sides.

That may be Bruce. But I don't recall a World Cup where the All Blacks went into it worried by the opposition.

Hasn't stopped them peaking too early and then choking before though, has it?

There are no easy games for the top sides these days, even a side as good as New Zealand.

Steve

Inspired by the Swiss approach to winning the Americas Cup, I am wondering why they haven't bought up a few ex-All Blacks (Buck Shelford springs to mind...) and created a World Cup-winning rugby team.

They could call it "The Alinghi Blacks" !

(None of my countrymen find this concept even remotely funny...)

quote:

Originally posted by Bruce Woodhouse:
Did England win by actually playing some Rugby yesterday-or did I just hallucinate? I've never seen so many offloads by an English team. Lots of errors too but the back row added some pace, the reccyling was faster and Corry looked happier in the second row.

Bruce

I think this is Ashton's influence showing. I actually felt that some of this was starting to show in the game against Ireland, but too many mistakes were made there and the pack was constantly being pushed backwards by the ferocity of the Irish forwards. It is too little, too late for the wc but it is nice to finally see an England team playing rugby again and the forwards in the ascendency against a major team. Make no mistake, France didn't play because they were not allowed to.

Mark

quote:

Make no mistake, France didn't play because they were not allowed to

A tempting illusion I think. For the first 30 minutes at least, and sporadically thereafter, England turned over ball and gave France several opportunities due to errors and generally slack play. France were just not awake.

Congratulations to France, although Ireland should really have won it. The last minute lapse against the French cost them the Grand Slam and the last minute score conceded today against Italy cost them the championship. They have been the best team overall, I think.

England today had their worst game of the six nations so far in my opinion. This was worse than against Ireland and only two breakaway tries and some poor decision making and passing from Shane Williams prevented a scoreline of around 40 points difference.

The England forwards were just not at the races and the backs had hardly any decent ball to play with. England were shunted off the ball at the scrum, were poor in the lineout and were being hammered at the breakdown. Every loose ball was pounced on by the Welsh, they drove England backwards, consistently broke the gain line, off-loaded superbly and they thoroughly deserved to win the game.

A very inconsistent campaign from an England point of view and a lot of hard work to do before the world cup.

Mark

quote:

Congratulations to France, although Ireland should really have won it

They've peaked too early...

It gives me a huge amount of pleasure to say that England were absolutely shite today - but rekindled memories of our ( Wales ) performance against Scotland a few weeks back.
I can't imagine that the All Blacks are feeling too nervous after what has been a very disappointing 6 nations all round.

Glenda

Congrats to Wales. Watching the game I actually wanted them to win-they played with intensity, agression and pace that I'm not sure many teams would have handled today. England were blown away, they looked hopeless, and conspicously leaderless too. It is a young team-fine, but then James Hook is no grizzled vet. The problem begins in the pack though.

Bruce

quote:

Originally posted by glenda:
It gives me a huge amount of pleasure to say that England were absolutely shite today.

Indeed. Although I'm not entirely sure that Wales' achievments yesterday/this tournament merited the celebrations they got.

Nobody wanted to budge from their seats after the match so we were stuck there watching as Wales took their lap of hours to some bonkers noise. God know what it would be like if they actually won something menaingful instead of dodging the wooden spoon ... ;-)

Duncan