6 Nations kicks off Saturday

Can't draw much solace from England's win, the Sweaties were just awful, Wales were not much better in the second half and Italy, while applying good pressure for most of the game, just made too many dumb ass errors.

Three one sided games which probably established Ireland as presumptive faves, they certainly look the best balanced with far and away the most nous behind the scrum, their trip to Twickers will most likely settle things, should we come to hand and win that it may well come down to points scored assuming the French don't sweep the whole thing and they haven't looked to me as though they have the game for that.

Lord Tisdale wrote:

Can't draw much solace from England's win, the Sweaties were just awful, Wales were not much better in the second half and Italy, while applying good pressure for most of the game, just made too many dumb ass errors.

Three one sided games which probably established Ireland as presumptive faves, they certainly look the best balanced with far and away the most nous behind the scrum, their trip to Twickers will most likely settle things, should we come to hand and win that it may well come down to points scored assuming the French don't sweep the whole thing and they haven't looked to me as though they have the game for that.

Sorry Tis but nobody really ca...           

Punditry ain't what it used to be  
Someone ought to tell him.

Lord Tisdale wrote:

Can't draw much solace from England's win, the Sweaties were just awful, Wales were not much better in the second half and Italy, while applying good pressure for most of the game, just made too many dumb ass errors.

Three one sided games which probably established Ireland as presumptive faves, they certainly look the best balanced with far and away the most nous behind the scrum, their trip to Twickers will most likely settle things, should we come to hand and win that it may well come down to points scored assuming the French don't sweep the whole thing and they haven't looked to me as though they have the game for that.

I agree, England are average and Scotland are just awful, again. Wales are going backwards and yes, I would say the Irish look like the favourites. There's nothing outstanding from any country so far.

I think the most entertaining match will be Italy v Scotland, I quite fancy the opera singers.

I'm not the biggest TV sport fan, but against my better judgement, I watched that France England thing. I couldn't believe how the quality had dropped from years gone by.
I think they should lay off the gym, learn to walk properly again, and get shirts that actually fit and resemble a rugger shirt.
And too many fireworks and opera divas singing anthems. It really is in the worst possible Americana taste. Does Europe have a history anymore ?
The only winners will be the multi national Counts.

There's only one reason for all of that Penz...commercialism = money, unfortunately rugby is going down the 'soccer' route.

Winter Green wrote:

I'm not the biggest TV sport fan, but against my better judgement, I watched that France England thing. I couldn't believe how the quality had dropped from years gone by.

I'm guessing you are an old guy who never played a man's game or you would appreciate how far the game has moved on even since Jonno's boys brought home the bacon from Oz.

Shore it's not as pretty to watch for you girls and the changes in the lineout, scrum and breakdown do nothing to enhance the game as a spectacle, but the current England team with all its shortcomings would batter all the 'great' teams of the 70s, 80s and 90s and might even be just too powerful for our own WC winners from only a decade ago.

GOB wrote:

There's only one reason for all of that Penz...commercialism = money, unfortunately rugby is going down the 'soccer' route.

It does wrankle with the traditionalist in me while the money and the waste eat at the social conscience, the French, despite having access to the Stade, are spending 500 million Euros to build a new 82k cap rugby stadium in Evry, just South of Paris.

Me, I think it is insanity to have Twickers and Wembley in London then have to build an Olympic stadium, the Stade, with its retractable lower tier, serves pretty well for athletics, footy and the man's game as well as all the frou frou of concerts and many ither events.

Oh, and Winty, if you aren't interested, do me a favour and don't fooking read it.

Yes, I'm ancient now. My father played for Cornwall before he was hoiked off to Burma. I signed for Argaum and Albion in the 70s as the archetypal promising teenager. I played a few reserve games and decided I didn't want any part in a Saturday afternoon excuse for a punch up with a bunch of overweight lardies that had no hand eye coordination to speak of and were only there for the handshake and the booze. How boring. Football was far more fun, so I left. Not only that, I was earning money playing football and there were more women. What would you do ?

Winter Green wrote:

Yes, I'm ancient now. My father played for Cornwall before he was hoiked off to Burma. I signed for Argaum and Albion in the 70s as the archetypal promising teenager. I played a few reserve games and decided I didn't want any part in a Saturday afternoon excuse for a punch up with a bunch of overweight lardies that had no hand eye coordination to speak of and were only there for the handshake and the booze. How boring. Football was far more fun, so I left. Not only that, I was earning money playing football and there were more women. What would you do ?

Yep, as I thought, a classic case of "the older I get, the better I was".

I could tell you how the Rugger master got me expelled from my school, but I can't be arsed.
They really did and still do have a thing about footy.

Winter Green wrote:

I could tell you how the Rugger master got me expelled from my school, but I can't be arsed.
.

A huge disappointment for all I guess.

Something to do with being arsed?

I personally think we are in with as much of a chance as anybody in case France manage to improve and beat Wales and Ireland which I don't think they will. Ireland flattered themselves with their maul which is awesome but find an answer to that (like playing in their half for most of the match) and they will probably fizzle out. As Mockers said our fixtures certainly give us a good chance with Irish and Welsh having to come to twickers. I would have like us to beat the Scottish more convincingly as the points could be important come the end but keeping a clean sheet is worth something. The other thing to remember with the punditry is that they are always biased in favour of the home nations with the exception of England. If Wales had the current England team the pundits would be tipping us to lift the WC after we had won the six nations. We have some decent young players stepping up now and we are moving in the right direction if we don't win the six nations it will probably be down to those few minutes in the French game when we went to sleep and let them in with that try, not bad for no hopers.

The Southern hemisphere will dominate the World Cup as they usually do.
I guess it still has something to do with the gene pool rugby union picks from in this country. Totally the wrong sort to win anything really competitive on a consistent basis. A bit like tennis. Also, it probably doesn't do for the head of state's bunch to run riot over the provinces. That's not good politics.
By and large, outside of the sports that require hugely expensive equipment and facility, we aren't the greatest sporting nation that ever existed. We just don't play enough of it. Music and poetry is more our thing. And drinking competitively. Must be the climate I guess, that and having a rather large dictionary compared with most.

I don't agree with you on that one Penz. The Southern hemisphere have dominated rugby for decades but they have also been playing professional standards for decades, where as the Northern hemisphere are still playing catching up but they are, catching up. In a Southern Hemisphere v Northern hemisphere match I think the Southerners would win but there would be little in it. Where as fifteen years ago it would have been a slaughtering.

As for the rest of sport, well the Olympics showed what we can achieve if we wanted to, even if it was on our home soil. Admittedly, football standards internationally have been shockingly poor.

Neither do I agree that choice is made from the gene pool, It may have been years ago but no longer. There's too much money in rugby not to pick the best these days, whether that's the son of a lord or the son of a bricklayer.

The Olympic success was down to huge unaffordable financial input.
I see the synchronised swimming team are up in arms at the moment because they are about to lose millions of funding that was poured in.  Synchronised swimming !  Unbelievable the amount that was found for just 4 or 5 years. Spain did it too at their Olympics. Where are they now ? What happened to the Eastern block super countries ?

As for the bricklayer thing, their kids still don't tend to go to schools where rugby is played on a serious basis. I appreciate rugby has moved on a little bit, and Penzance/Newlyn Pirtes were never exactly renowned for their social graces locally. Mainly services/uniformed stock. But then all schools play it down that way. Not so much in England.

Lord Tisdale wrote:

Winter Green wrote:

Yes, I'm ancient now. My father played for Cornwall before he was hoiked off to Burma. I signed for Argaum and Albion in the 70s as the archetypal promising teenager. I played a few reserve games and decided I didn't want any part in a Saturday afternoon excuse for a punch up with a bunch of overweight lardies that had no hand eye coordination to speak of and were only there for the handshake and the booze. How boring. Football was far more fun, so I left. Not only that, I was earning money playing football and there were more women. What would you do ?

Yep, as I thought, a classic case of "the older I get, the better I was".

Think he was quite a useful player. A member of the Sutton High School team that reached the final of the English Schools knockout competition,  gaining the scalp of Millfield along the way. I believe old Wintery Green was also a couple of years younger than the rest of the team.

The first leg of the final against Washington Grammar School, Sunderland, was played at Roker Park. Stuffed 5 - 1 I think. We were all looking forward to Home Park for the second leg and they decided to re seed the pitch, early . Same old Argo, there must be something in the water. Seem to remember losing the game 2 - 1 at the Brickfields but I might be wrong. I'm even older than Watery Cabbage !

Winter Green wrote:

The Olympic success was down to huge unaffordable financial input.
I see the synchronised swimming team are up in arms at the moment because they are about to lose millions of funding that was poured in.  Synchronised swimming !  Unbelievable the amount that was found for just 4 or 5 years. Spain did it too at their Olympics. Where are they now ? What happened to the Eastern block super countries ?

As for the bricklayer thing, their kids still don't tend to go to schools where rugby is played on a serious basis. I appreciate rugby has moved on a little bit, and Penzance/Newlyn Pirtes were never exactly renowned for their social graces locally. Mainly services/uniformed stock. But then all schools play it down that way. Not so much in England.

This is true, I played rugby for west buck land inthe seventies, we slaugttered everybody. We were trained by two ex international players. I then got kicked out and went on to play for my next school, a comprehensive and got trained by a football coach who thought that 15 fat lads in scrum for the whole match was the way to go, we used to lose 50 0 most games. At Crownhill we didnt even play rugby.

I played football with two future England captains - OK, I played football with them & they became rugby internationals. John Scott at school & Les Cusworth at college.

I always recall when I first played in the college football team and Les & his mates were far more interested in kicking lumps out of the opposition and then seeing what they could damage & steal after the game. A couple of years later I played rugby for my year in the in-house tournament. Not much had changed. It just confirmed all my rugby prejudices. Far too many thugs pretending to be gentlemen.

Tringreen wrote:

Think he was quite a useful player.

In the girls game Tring, not man enough for the West Country's No.1 sport.

Iggy wrote:

This is true, I played rugby for west buck land inthe seventies, we slaugttered everybody.

'sfunny, I don't ever recall getting slaughtered by West Buck'teeth'land.

This weekend looks a cracker, no mismatches so all should be a contest.

Coupla beers in the refrigerator, the other half gone out and Wales - France. Luvverly jubbly...

Mock Cuncher wrote:

Coupla beers in the refrigerator, the other half gone out and Wales - France. Luvverly jubbly...

I nearly turned it off, what is all that bollocks with the lights and flames and shit?

Need Wales to win this, but I fooking hate the Welsh.

Is there anybody that you don't hate?