Six Nations summary 2012

Northern hemisphere test rugby ends for another season with Wales deservedly winning the championship and earning another Grand Slam. Mores the pity that they couldn't have made the RWC final and played us. Would've been a much greater spectacle than we had to play out against the doggedly dull current France team.

Anyway, on to the actual games. All nicely paired together in a winner takes all first v second title fight, a bronze medal match and a wooden spoon contest. All were highly watchable, like the entire six nations competition this year. It seems the NH  teams went to the RWC and had their eyes opened to the type of rugby they should be playing. I'm sure the recent rule changes have helped too, allowing competition for the ball at the breakdown. Sure has cut down on the amount of kicking. I'm guessing retirement of the the long standing no.10s has helped too. Without Wilkinson, Parks, Hook / Jones, O'Gara, Trinh-Duc, and any resemblance of a decent 1st five in Italy, the new no.10s have been learning their game live. Some have made mistakes but almost all have attempted to set their backs free. Its been good stuff.

Wales 16 v France 9

Richie, the real best player in
the World mocks you

Wales were good. France slightly less so. Supposedly the French demanded the roof stay open so they could play in the rain and nullify the feared Welsh back line. This is the same France who refused to play when it was a little cold a few weeks earlier. They got what they deserved and coughed up the ball 16 times. They look devoid of ideas and if I read one more bit of nonsense about Dussatoir being the best player in the world I'll blow my top. The definition for being the best player in the world is, 'would he make it into the All Blacks?' and the answer to that is no. Anyway, Cuthbert decided the contest when one of his mates picked up the ball that the Worlds Best Player dropped on the ground, scooped it out to his wing, and he finished ever so stylishly, sashaying past three frenchies on the way. I liked it. A deserved win and solid champions. A bummer that Ireland are touring us this year and not the Whalers.

England 30 v Ireland 9
On paper it looked good. An ever improving England shorn of the dross that Martin Johnson picked have grown in confidence under Lancaster. The pack look like they're back to doing what England do best, domination of set pieces. The backs look reasonably good too, if a little bit obvious about what they're doing. Such a pity though that Ireland turned up with 8 ladies in the forwards and 7 schoolboys in the backs. Errors abounded. Drop ball everywhere. Were they drunk before the game because it was St Patrick's Day? The ladies in the scrum spent most of the afternoon looking for lost knitting needles and discussing embroidery patterns. It was embarassing and it started to look dangerous too at the end. I fear for their confidence in the future such was the total demolition they underwent. The ABs are going to totally smashify them into the middle of the next decade.

Italy 13 v Scotland 6
I didn't watch this. I don't watch losers. haha. Nah...not really. I've invested a bit of time this 6 nations in both teams. Scotland had looked promising early in games but get to around the 60 minute mark and they just fall away. This must be something like fitness, strength, and stamina taking a toll. Recent published stats in one of the broadsheets showed that Scotland had the smallest, lightest players and would therefore finish last. Hopefully this isn't necessarily true and rugby can still be played by all, but Scotland appear to be proving it this year at least. Italy continue to have problems finding a bloke at 10 who can kick properly. If they could've found that man earlier, they would've had a win over England as well as Scotland  to celebrate this year.