Six Nations possibilities

The last round of Six Nations matches takes place tomorrow and whilst the tournament is technically still open, Wales are the overwhelming favourites to win. There are four possible results tomorrow, three of them will result in a Welsh title and the fourth is very unlikely. The first, and most likely, would be for Wales to beat France. I’m not in the habit of looking up bookmakers odds (living in the US, I can’t bet on any matches) but I would certainly consider Wales favourites to win. France were lacklustre for most of the match last week and that was at home to a weaker side than Wales. Going to Cardiff they will have to play a lot better and with nothing on the line for them, I’m not sure they’ll be motivated enough. A victory for Wales will give them a Grand Slam, and by extension the Six Nations title regardless of what England do against Ireland.

The second possibility is that Wales lose and England lose or draw. Although Wales would miss out on the Grand Slam in this scenario, they would still take the title with four wins to England’s three. If Wales do lose their match then I don’t think this is an unlikely outcome, but I do think that England have a real chance to beat Ireland. We have played much better in the last two matches, although need to work on holding onto leads late in the match, and at home I think I just about back us to win. It’s a close thing though and I would not be surprised if Ireland win and secure Wales a title that way.

The third and fourth possibilities are that Wales lose and England win with the distinction being drawn by the margins of the results. In this scenario, both teams would finish with four wins and one loss and the title would go to the team with the better point difference. As mentioned above, I think this scenario is unlikely overall, but more likely than the second one. What is very unlikely, though, is England being on the right side of it. Currently Wales have a point difference of +44 to England’s +6. In other words, in the event that England even have a chance to win the title they are likely to be faced with a scenario of needing to score about five tries to do it. I would thus like to take this opportunity to be the first to offer Wales my congratulations on their first Six Nations title in four years.

The other, less interesting, less interesting match tomorrow is the Italy v Scotland wooden spoon/whitewash decider. I said a few weeks ago that this match would be a great chance for Italy to record an upset and it still is. Neither side have looked very good, but Italy are at home and pushed England pretty hard there in the second round of matches. I think Scotland are still favourites to win, but they will need to play well.

I was mostly right

In a way, I did a pretty good job of predicting the weekend’s matches. I correctly called one win out of two for England’s women, a win for Wales and a win for Liverpool. The only things I got wrong were a washout in the other women’s match (I predicted a Kiwi win) and the England men winning their T20 (by quite a lot, as it transpired). So on the face of it, I did okay. It was the details that went a bit awry though.

First off, an English victory in the T20. We are the World Champions and world number one in that format, but I never feel comfortable saying that we will win. I know I’ve said it before, but there is a huge element of luck in T20s and I think England have been almost more fortunate than good in the past. Yesterday though saw a very skilful performance by young Jonny Bairstow who hit an unbeaten 60 to propel us to 150-7 after a slow start. Once again though, it was the bowlers who really won the match for us. The captain led from the front with 2-12 from 3.2 overs and was ably backed up by Finn (as usual), Swann (2-17) and Dernbach (1-13 from three overs). Pakistan were 33-4 after the powerplay and all but out of the match at 50-5. Afridi and Hammad Azam had a go near the end, but it was already too late and when Azam was out Pakistan capitulated. Afridi started turning down singles and looked like he was going to just bat out the 20 overs, before getting impatient and skewing a catch. One of the biggest factors in the run chase was England’s outstanding fielding. Of the ten wickets to fall, nine of them were caught (with the other run out) and at least eight of the catches were difficult ones. If England had dropped even a few of those the match would have been a lot closer, but as it was Pakistan never had a chance.

That was going on at the same time as the Six Nations match between England and Wales. Whilst I correctly predicted the outcome, I didn’t expect England to make their match so close. England actually led until fairly late at Twickenham, coming back well after a dismal first 20 minutes. It is a mark of how well they did that the loss was still gutting, with Wales getting a very late try and England not quite being able to match it at the death. Still, England can take a lot of positives from that match. After a horror start to the match that saw Wales completely dominate possession England turned it around and dominated the next 20 minutes to almost the same extent, playing a surprisingly fluent passing game. They had good width and were able to force Wales back well. The one thing they could not do, however, was get over the tryline, though it took an incredible tackle from, as I recall, Sam Warburton to deny Manu Tuilangi at one point. What England will particularly rue though is the ten minute man advantage that they wasted. After kicking the penalty to go 12-6 in front, they did not get possession for the next five minutes as Wales held on to the ball and gradually worked it down the pitch. England did eventually manage to get a lineout on the Welsh 22, but made an absolute hash of it despite being a man up. By the time Wales were back to 15 they had scored a penalty and had the momentum, which they didn’t really relinquish until England’s last ditch effort to bring the scores level. It was, as I said, a very disappointing result in the end but there is at least more cause for optimism ahead of the last two matches. Wales, meantime, having won the Triple Crown have a great chance for a Grand Slam. Effectively, they only need to beat France at the Millennium Stadium.

The big result was the League Cup though. I said that I thought Cardiff would score a goal, but Liverpool would score at least two. I was half right: Cardiff did go in front in the first half, but Liverpool equalised in the second. Cardiff’s goal came against the run of play, and although they did have other chances (including a heart-stopping moment a few minutes before the second half ended) Liverpool were always the more positive side. We had what seemed like dozens of corners (I lost count), hit the woodwork a couple of times and it seemed like we were almost constantly threatening. Whilst there was some of the profligacy in front of goal that has plagued us all season, Cardiff were also very good. They never seemed to tire in defence and kept charging down shots and attempts to pass the ball in the box. The effort looked like it had worn them down in the end though, as after all the chances we had had it was a relatively meek one by Kuyt that put us in front 2-1 in extra time. After that was where Cardiff really deserve credit though, they did not drop their heads, they did not give up. They came back, put us under pressure and got the last gasp equaliser. I’m sure the adrenaline of a big match helped, but how many teams could go behind after 108 minutes and still have the energy to come back in the 118th? It was a phenomenal show of fight from them and they deserve no end of praise for it. I thought that it would be enough to win them the match, myself. We have been very poor at normal penalties this season and apart from Gerrard and Kuyt I did not know on whom we could rely to take them. Fortunately Suarez, after his howler last week, was not amongst the five. I had been pessimistic to start, so when Gerrard had his saved and Charlie Adam followed up with an attempt that looked like he was aiming for the net at Anfield instead of Wembley, I was despairing. Kuyt was as reliable as ever though, and some hope appeared when the Cardiff players missed badly too. In the end it was Downing and Johnson who scored the vital last two penalties, much to my astonishment and delight, before poor Anthony Gerrard, Stevie’s cousin, missed for Cardiff.

I’m still, of course, ecstatic about having snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and finally getting some silverware. King Kenny is also now the first person to win a career treble as both a player and manager, though he’s helped by having done some of them at the same time, of course! And I could be wrong, but I think the win also guarantees European football at Anfield next year. Whilst we still need to push hard for a top four finish, it’s nice to know that we have the Europa League on which to fall back should that not go our way. We’ll be able to help ourselves in that respect soon too, as our next Premiership match is at home to Arsenal who rather annoyingly won today.

Ultimately, it’s been a pretty good weekend.

Six Nations thoughts

I was preoccupied by the Test match, but I watched the two of the first three Six Nations matches at the weekend. I already talked a bit on the Armchair Selector about the Scotland v England match, but I don’t think I emphasised how lacklustre England still looked. It didn’t really surprise me, given the number of new faces in the side, but they did not fill me with confidence. The defence especially looked patchy and were fortunate to concede only six points. It was a poor match from both sides, however, and not a particularly entertaining one. Both sides will need to improve in order to finish high in the table.

The other match I watched was Ireland v Wales. After the meetings at the World Cup and last year’s Six Nations it looked before the match like it could be the best fixture of the entire of the tournament and will certainly take some beating. As disappointed as Ireland will be to have lost, Wales were probably the deserved victors. The did not quite dominate play, I thought, but they looked more fluid and better organised. Had they been on the losing side I think they would have been just as disappointed overall, albeit with a less singular cause. With Wales hosting France later in the tournament, this win should put them clear favourites for the title.

The match I did not watch was France v Italy. (There was cricket on and I only have so many hours in a day.) France won, which is no surprise, though I heard that Italy played better than they have in the past. Italy may have a decent chance to spring an upset this year; they host England and Scotland both of whom look to be amongst the weaker teams in the tournament. Next Saturday is Italy v England and France v Ireland, with Wales v Scotland on Sunday. I’m tipping England to win against Italy, but they will not find it straightforward, France to beat Ireland in a reasonably good match and Wales to overcome Scotland fairly easily.