Rugby

Wales beat Italy by 30 points but Ireland remain top despite Darcy and O Driscoll not recovering in time.

Scotland 13-40 Ireland
Eddie O'Sullivan's RBS 6 Nations favourites took another big step towards the title and only a second ever Grand Slam success with a convincing 27-point victory at Murrayfield.

Ireland lived up to their billing even without the dynamic duo of Brian O'Driscoll and Gordon D'Arcy pulling the strings in midfield

England vs France tomorrow

Must say i am very confident of Ireland's chances for the grand slam now after winning so comprehensively today without probably the two best centres in the world. they should be back for the england game in 2 weeks

france beat england 18-17 today in London, England led 17-8 at half time but amazingly failed to score in the second half and missed 6 kicks at goal during the match.

ireland,wales& France all have 6 pts with Ireland top on points difference
england,scotland&italy all have 0 points.

no matches next week but in two weeks time it is

Scotland vs Italy
France vs Wales
Ireland vs England

france beat england 18-17 today in London, England led 17-8 at half time but amazingly failed to score in the second half and missed 6 kicks at goal during the match.

I used to hate that England were often seen as a one man team but we would have won by half time if Jonny Wilkinson was playing

The team lacks leadership and character but these are things that develop with experience and cant be solved overnight

Originally Posted by Stezagud

I used to hate that England were often seen as a one man team but we would have won by half time if Jonny Wilkinson was playing
(

yes i dont think anyone could argue with that, if wilkinson had been playing ye would have won.

who do you think will win 6 nations now that england are out of the running?

hahaha .... we'll still win it

No, just kidding.

I think it'll come down to where Ireland play Wales and France, one of them should be at home for you and i can't see England beating Ireland next weekend, especially away. Although, alot may rest on when O'Driscoll and Darcy come back ... if they come back and are fit, then that'll be it .... it'll be Ireland's to lose then. However, if those two struggle to get fit for any games, then it could go 3 ways, it's that close.

As good as Wales have played, i think if you put the hits on Williams (the one who thinks he's ronaldo) and Henson (and also don't keep kicking the ball to him like England did), they'll go down and Wales' game will be more limited. Whereas Ireland at least have some other players who can influence a game. As for France, well that's anyone's guess. They were fortunate to win today, much like last weekend. A solid display will beat them though and i think that the most solid of all teams is Ireland right now.

well the 6 nations is hotting up now with wales ireland and france all tied at the top after wining both games, all have still to play each other and each have one home game and one away game, ireland possibly are slight favourites, but a 3-way tie at the top is a distinct possibility, england could finish 4th!

as for this weekend's matches;

scotland v ireland;

a great start by scotland and they caught ireland cold and scored a great try, but then ireland woke up and dominated the rest of the game and won comfortably despite the lack of darcy and o'driscoll

italy v wales;

no great surprise in the fact that the welsh backs took apart their italian counterparts, but what was a surprise was that both packs were fairly even, as many believe the italian one was far superior, this meant that the welsh back were given plenty of the ball, and they made us pay with 6 tries (even if some were dubious). wales basically thrased us and i stopped watching after 60 mins. wales playing very well

england v france;

as everyone has said, if england had had the kicking machine that is jonny wilkinson, this game would have been over by half time. france were terrible and england could have put 40 possibly 50 points on them, however the england kickers especially hodgson, missed many kicks, that yashevilli did not, and although france improved a little in the second half, they did not deserve this victory, i can not remember one instance when they threatened or even when they were in the english 22! england gifted them this victory with too many needless fouls. france won the game by kicking penalites from the english 10m line. for france michalak needs to play at fly-half, as they lack creativity, only traille looks capable of doing something with the ball in hand atm for france. england need to improve.

as for the next weekend matches.

scotland v italy;

the wooden spoon match up, scotland favourites, but i really don't want another wooden spoon, we've got enough already in our short history in this competition

france v wales

wales playing great, france playing badly but both are winning, scotland nearly won here, wales have a great chance and if they win here they would become the favourites to win the whole compettion. however france are winning, and i think they will just edge it.

ireland v england;

england have lost 8 out of their last 11 games, their last 3 six nations games have also all been lost, they miss jonny wilkinson and many of the retired wc players. ireland will have their all star centres back and will be full of confidence, this is the game of the week, and ireland to me are favourites, england although have a great pack and a dangerous back line, can not seem to play great as a team. should be a very close game, and only a few points will seperate the two sides, i think ireland will win but will not be surprised if england do thou.

Nobody is going to stop France.
It would have favoured Ireland if England beat France.
Someone is going to be on the wrong end of an english backlash, unfortunately Ireland play them next.
Wales are going to be a prick of a team to beat as well.

who do you think will win 6 nations now that england are out of the running?

I think Ireland will now.

England needed a moral boosting win against France if they were to challenge Ireland but after the manner of the defeat i think we will be totally drained of confidence. It may be a close game it may even come down to a few precious penalties, if it does i cant see Englands kickers handling the immense pressure they will be under after the France game.

Wales are good if they can play the game their way but Ireland will dictate play when they meet and i doubt the Welsh will cope.

France have been awful both games yet somehow have 2 wins If they win the torunament it will be an absolute travesty

Ireland will do the grand slam. O'Driscol is back next week and hopefully altought i dont think we will, Gordon D'Arcy will be back in a couple of weeks. England to put it frank are lost without Wilkinson, but then again so would any side. France are not on form but deadly when they are adn wales are a bit of a surprise package. But having said all that, Ireland are starting to pick up their form now, the win over the Scots was a great morale booster particularly for O'Gara and we do have the best back line around at the moment. So I'm confident we can win it but I will obviously love the GS

I don't think it's just JW we miss and it's complete nonsense to think that it's just him that we are lost without. Be honest with yourselves ( whoever you support ) and see how well your team would do if you lost as many players as England have ........ not very well i would imagine. We miss leadership, experience, knowledge, creativity ... and of course kicking reliability. Any team without key players like Johnson, Dallaglio, Leonard, Back, Hill, Tindall, Wilkinson, Bracken, Greenwood, Cohen, Catt, Balshaw, Moody and Luger are going to be effected.

But that's by the by and the fact was we lost because we couldn't kick the ball between the posts. Surely Paddy De Nagan you have to be confident that Ireland have one of their best chances to beat France for ages, France are playing poorly and a low creative England side managed to score 2 easy tries against them through missed tackles. If you add O'Driscoll & or Darcy to the picture for you guys (depending on fitness) you should score even more than we did.

Go England & Ireland

Originally Posted by Jim_UK

I think it'll come down to where Ireland play Wales and France, one of them should be at home for you and i can't see England beating Ireland next weekend, especially away. Although, alot may rest on when O'Driscoll and Darcy come back ... if they come back and are fit, then that'll be it .... it'll be Ireland's to lose then. However, if those two struggle to get fit for any games, then it could go 3 ways, it's that close.

As good as Wales have played, i think if you put the hits on Williams (the one who thinks he's ronaldo) and Henson (and also don't keep kicking the ball to him like England did), they'll go down and Wales' game will be more limited. Whereas Ireland at least have some other players who can influence a game. As for France, well that's anyone's guess. They were fortunate to win today, much like last weekend. A solid display will beat them though and i think that the most solid of all teams is Ireland right now.

hi have not been around for a while so catching up now on the comments.
jim ireland play France in Dublin but are away to Wales in the last game. I think Ireland are slight favourites for each of their 3 remaining games but i must emphasise slight as it wouldnt be a major shock if they lost to any of the teams as england, france and wales are all top teams. i am confident for the grand slam though, i actually put a bet of €15 at 5 to 1 on Ireland to do the grand slam before the 6 nations started.

regarding englands injuries, they are after getting a couple more at the weekend. i acknowledge that england would have probably won both their games if it hadnt been for their injuries.

Speaking of Gavin Henson.

Here is a bit of info about him. the gelled hair that probably takes hours to fix, the fake tan we all know about but here is two more things about him.

he wears silver boots because gold boots would not match with the red wales jersey!

he also you might have noticed wears a long sleeved red t shirt underneath his jersey because he wants to cover his wrists as he doesnt like the look of them!

interesting guy to say the least!!

More wins for Wales and Ireland and another loss for England. I wasn't expecting us to beat Ireland in Dublin, not with Ireland having their tails up and playing well. However, i am a bit gutted that we were basically camped in their 22 for that last 10 mins and got nothing. Not sure what the deal was when the ref was 100% certain that the ball was not grounded when Thomson (i think) went over. How could he tell when there were about 8 people on top of it ? He must have X-Ray eyes to see under that lot !

Still, Ireland were the better team and remain on course for the Grand Slam. I still would like them to win it more than the Welsh as it would wipe that smug grin off of Jonathan Davies' face God i hate him.

Anyway, it does look all set for a Grand Slam decider in Cardiff on the last game, which will be exciting.

what a game, thought england were going to take it in the end tho.
tough irish defence was the key imo.

great win for Ireland but were lucky to hold on but i think they deserved it because the try england got was such a soft try and o gara did miss a few kicks.

about the ball being grounded johnny o connor was in the refs way so he couldnt see it properly from where he was positioned, the ref probbaly should have used the video ref.

Brian O' Driscoll=the best (his 1st try against England and what a time to get it!)

Did ye see Darcy and Roy Keane sitting alongside each other?

with darcy almost recovered i think we will do the grand slam but its going to be tough against Henson and co. in cardiff (was very surprised wales beat France)

it is possible to win the grand slam but i hate being over-optomistic because when i am, it nearly never goes my way