After a test that hurt your eyes against Scotland, a test that hurt your heart against France...

After a test that hurt your eyes against Scotland, a test that hurt your heart against France… It  was a brilliant display of heart by the Irish players, absolutely putting their bodies on the line for Ireland.  It could have been BOD’s swansong at the Aviva, and I think the medics realized fairly quickly the only way they would keep him off the pitch was to cosh him and handcuff him to the stretcher. We played the match the wrong way around – if we’d been losing and then come back to get the draw the whole stadium would have been rocking. Instead, it was us letting a lead slip away and the French jumping up and down at the whistle.  There were lots of good things about the match, especially the form of the new players. Two years ago, Connor Murray was a rookie, Paddy Jackson was doing his leaving cert, Luke Marshall was playing underage rugby and Peter O’Mahony was unheard of. We just needed a little bit more that we couldn’t find , so so agonizingly close…

In the first match of the weekend, Scotland and Wales slugged it out and Wales were the last men standing. The size and commitment of the Scottish players is impressive, those are BIG feckers. Their handling and discipline is less impressive though, and they had the crowd raging and gasping in exasperation many a time. Their defense is absolutely top notch, and Wales, like Ireland really struggled to break it down. But they eventually built up a head of steam to win the match and set up a tournament decider with England next week.
Finally
it was modest Italy taking on the mighty English at Twickenham.  The first half saw England with all the ball, kicking penalties, but butchering numerous try scoring activities, You could just see them thinking – this is going to get easy like, just now. But it didn’t and Italy came roaring back in the second half, scoring a brilliant opportunistic try, and in the end England were hanging on desperately, praying for the whistle. It was a massive effort for Italy, who deserved a draw, but also determined defence from England to save the day. Best Italian performance I’ve seen I think. Their front row play will have Healy, Best and Ross booking extra chiropractor sessions.

RBS Six Nations
Saturday , March 9
Scotland 18 - 28 Wales 
Ireland 13 - 13 France 
Sunday , March 10
England 18 - 11 Italy