1. The real Scotland finally stand up
After 10 attempts under Vern Cotter’s tutelage Scotland have finally won a Six Nations match. After the seemingly false dawn of their impressive World Cup, Scotland haven’t managed to consistently fire in the first two matches of the tournament but on Saturday the sub-units of their team started to show what they are capable of.
Up front, Alasdair Dickinson, Ross Ford and WP Nel had a field day at the set piece as they won penalty after penalty against a scrum that historically has been one of the most feared in the tournament. Apart from WP Nel’s comical attempt at an intercept, which gave him a 10 minute breather, the three front men could not have pleased Cotter any more.
The back row was also formidable. John Barclay and John Hardie are starting to click and now Scotland need to solve their uncertainty at number eight. Ryan Wilson did extremely well considering he was a late injury replacement for David Denton, but he is by no means the finished article, while Denton himself has struggled for form with club and country. Josh Strauss must now be considered as his impressive club form cannot go unnoticed.
At the back, Stuart Hogg was sublime and his offload for Seymour’s try would not have looked out of place in Super Rugby. Seymour himself is growing with every game and is now worthy of being first choice for quite some time ahead. All in all, it was a performance worthy of a 16 point winning margin.
2. Southern Hemisphere still in a different league
If we are completely honest with ourselves and move patriotic pride to one side then we have to admit that this Six Nations has been devoid of consistent quality thus far. There are all sorts of arguments to why but with the players in mid-season it is not unreasonable to expect a higher standard of rugby.
Super Rugby arrived with a loud, yet refreshing, bang from the South. Admittedly most of the defence coaches shouldn’t be in jobs much longer, but considering this was the first round of matches there was some dazzling rugby on display.
We had unbelievable come backs and tries galore, but most impressive to watch was the ‘heads up rugby’. Coaches talk about persistently but we rarely see it in the Northern Hemisphere. If there was a gap, someone ran into it and nine times out of 10 the ball made it into their hands and through they went. It sounds simple, but it is this execution of the basic skills that marks the difference between the very best and the rest.
3. Wales still don’t seem to have a Plan B
This was yet another match that Wales should have won by a lot more but due to their fairly one-dimensional style, at times it felt like they were trying not to lose, rather than win, at the Principality Stadium.
Parts of Wales’ game are hugely impressive and they can certainly claim to have one of the best defensive units in World Rugby, so if that is the case then why not focus on expanding the attack more?
Jamie Roberts has been used as a battering ram to great affect at times, but it means Jonathan Davies does not see as much ball as he might like – and it means when he does get it, he’s tempted to have a run himself rather than spread the ball to others.
Davies made just one pass against France. There were two behemoth wingers outside him and Liam Williams is incredibly dangerous with ball in hand so surely it needs to be part of the game plan to get it to them more often? Cuthbert touched the ball three times; North four.
Wales could be the most exciting team to watch and it’s clearly not a case of things not quite clicking as the game plan is obvious, but they are good enough to experiment a bit more and against a very poor French team it was the perfect opportunity to do so.
4. Small strides in the right direction
There was plenty to bemoan about England’s performance against Ireland – their inability to keep the scoreboard ticking over in the first half, not taking their chances when they came along, and the usual indiscipline – but when you take a step back you can understand the errors a bit better.
Maro Itoje is the perfect example of how Jones is drip-feeding the talented youngsters into the equation. The world and their mothers were clamouring for Itoje to be in from the start of the tournament but Jones was biding his time.
His partnership with George Kruis was excellent, as was Billy Vunipola, while Jack Nowell’s tackle and Anthony Watson’s fleet of foot also brought joy to England fans.
What England need to be wary of is that they haven’t been truly tested yet. Scotland did not perform to their potential, Italy had a very weak second half and the scoreline probably flattered Ireland on Saturday. The real barometer will come against Wales and France, the only other two teams that are really still in contention for the title.
5. Ireland’s attack needs surgery
I’m not referring to Johnny Sexton’s seemingly permanent sore neck here but rather the poor execution of Ireland’s attacking play at times over the weekend. They did manage to open England up on a couple of occasions and but for an incredible Jack Nowell cover tackle, Robbie Henshaw would have scored one of Twickenham’s great tries, but in general their accuracy and variety just wasn’t there.
Whether it be miscommunication, poor handling or basic errors at the set piece, it stopped Ireland building any real pressure when they needed it.
More surprising was that it was mainly the seasoned campaigners that let them down. Rory Best missed his man three times; Conor Murray’s service was slow and inaccurate during periods of the game and Jamie Heaslip struggled to gain any sort of parity against Billy Vunipola.
The positives for Ireland after three games without a win will be that their newest caps are quietly acquitting themselves well. Stuart McCloskey was monstrous in defence and attack whilst Josh van der Flier was Ireland’s best back row by far. Ultan Dillane also looked impressive from the bench.
Ireland need their big name players to step up in kind if they are to get out of this rut.
6. Referees becoming too big a point of a talking point
The officiating in the Championship so far has not been up to the standard that we expect and that was never more obvious than round three. Without singling out one individual in particular it was noticeable that there are a few trends creeping into officiating that need to change.
The first one is speaking to the players by their first name. This was most evident on Friday night. The referee is not there to be anyone’s friend and at the breakdown he should not be asking ‘Dan’ to roll away, or for for ‘Alun Wyn’ to release. This is too familiar for the furnace of test match rugby and bellowing out ‘SIX RED, MOVE’ would have a greater affect.
The other points surround the scrum and TMO. The scrum, as mentioned repeatedly, is nowadays a way of gaining penalties rather than quick ball, but if a ref penalised a scrum half for feeding or a hooker for having his foot up at the first scrum we could get a contest and some ball with which to play.
The TMO yet again, not of his own fault this time, has reared his head from the car park. Josh van der Flier was denied a try on Saturday simply because of the ref’s question to the man in the van. He should have asked ‘is there any reason not to award the try’ rather than the easy way out of ‘try, yes or no?’ The use of the TMO is an issue that does not look like disappearing any time soon.
Andy Daniel
Follow Andy on twitter (@scrum5ive)
Photo by: Patrick Khachfe / Onside Images
18 replies on “6 things we learned from the weekend’s rugby”
Completely unconvinced by this: “The real Scotland finally stand up” – yes they looked better than they have, but let’s be honest, they were playing Italy. They should look good against Italy – it doesn’t matter if they had won this fixture by 1 point or 100 – they simply can’t do it against better teams.
Don’t allow them off the hook – otherwise they’ll never get better. They were fine – they got a win, which is what they needed, but they have to find a system that means that they don’t constantly get beaten except for one “sublime” performance against a team that is most likely going to get whitewashed. Completely unconvinced by their World Cup form – I think they got lucky, and they’re still riding the coattails of that, which means they’re just going to continue to be whipping boys for another four years.
The standard of Northern Hemisphere rugby is never going to improve if we call that a ‘stunning’ performance. They made it look difficult in my opinion to be perfectly honest.
On the Irish attack – it looked to me as though they have moves. 1) kick the ball and 2) run American Football style blocks.
The Henshaw almost try come off the back of Sexton running a loop round someone as they then blocked off the English tackler. Poite did penalise Ireland a few times for this on Saturday but for the two of the Irish breaks, they should have been penalised for blocking.
Totally understand that all teams use RL style dummy runners these days, but I don’t want to see if cross over into the American football style blocking to allow runners through.
Ha. Was just thinking about pointing this out only to find you’d beaten me to it!
I think it was an Irish prop that provided the utterly blatant block that lead to Sexton’s break and Henshaw’s run.
I like to think that the TMO would have called it back, but who knows. It was literally right in front of the ref and he didn’t call it
Yeh it was really blatant, I was shouting at the TV in real time but no one seems to have mentioned it in the media since. It seems to be a real strategy for Ireland, but not one I’d want to see become common place.
Couldn’t agree more. I wish they’d do something about the blocking at re-starts as well
Lol like Mako Vunipola was going to catch Sexton! Get real!
Not the point Cathal had it been Watson, Brown or Nowell there’s no issue then but its fair game if its Dot Cotton?
Nathan White didn’t effect the view of Mako Vunipola so that’s is just an excuse more than anything. Plus, Ireland have got f-all from the officials in all three matches so if that was illegal the ref would most certainly have spotted it.
The reason the TMO was asked “yes or no” is because there are English hands all over the ball and bodies everywhere, blocking every angle. No-one could see the ball clearly touched down and thus the try wasn’t given.
You can say the same thing about Hartley’s effort that went down short of the line. If Poite had asked “is there any reason…” this would have been a try too.
As detailed above, there were a lot of issues with the officials on Saturday, and it seems odd to highlight this one just because Schmidt had a moan about it.
I don’t think that’s a fair comparison as Hartley was visibly stopped before the line. If he had asked ‘any reason…?’ the answer would still probably have been ‘no’ (which would have been correct). In Van der Flier’s case he’s clearly over the line and while it’s inconclusive I think there’s more of a case for asking the more generous question on the basis of the likelihood that some part of the ball had been grounded legally.
Personally, I think if you can’t see something you can’t give it – but if that means that defence coaches are going to get cute and teach players how to block all of the camera angles then maybe they should just start giving them to discourage that sort of rubbish.
The thing with the TMO is the answer should be the same whatever the question. If the ref asks “is there any reason not to award a try” then surely (in this case) the answer should have been “Yes there’s a reason, because there is no clear and obvious grounding”. Poite asked “try, yes or no” to which the answer was “no try, because there is no clear and obvious grounding”.
TMOs and refs know the ball needs to be grounded. If there is no clear and obvious grounding of the ball, then it is not a try.
Just a general comment; I was well impressed with Hogg but should I be with a player who commits two defenders and gives a pass BEFORE going into contact, I thought that was a basic skill. But I am glad to see someone can do it, bring on a lions test cap.
I am tired of hearing commentators going on about how good rush defences are, they only work so well because there are no centres that can pass a ball under pressure. England have come the closest by playing a fly-half in the centres but even they are not that good at it. The problem is that if you are not huge then you do not get picked or you get shoved to fullback or the wing where you can come into the line and “create” or play rugby as some ike to call it. Since when did passing becoming as speciallity “I like XXXX he is a really good passer” like that is something special, sad thing is, it is something special. I hope Slade gets picked when fit again, and I think he will.
Sorry, the weather has been fine on the most part and the rugby has still been average. If we are ever to develop a Plan B as people love calling it then we need to sharpen up our passing skills. .
The Real Scotland stood up, oh please.
They beat their wooden spoon rivals convincingly, if they can get a result against France or Ireland you will have a basis to go on but you really have jumped the shark on this one.
I totally agree, but I think you mean, “jumped the gun”.
Can we compromise on a Shark with a gun?
Can’t imagine a shark with a tiny starters pistol so we are going to have to upgrade it to a machine gun.
Hold on I think we have the making of a plot for Sharknado 5, we need to talk…….
Irelands set piece in this championship has been appalling! I don’t know how the Irishplayers can honestly think that they could be anyone without a scrum or line out? It’s like trying to live without a heart! Secondly when Andy Farrell comes in he seriously needs to change our defence as it’s much to narrow for the Morden game of rugby. Teams that play a wide game (Argentina and England) ripped us open time and time again, Wales are the most one dimensional side out of Al the tier 1 countries and France where just awful where the reasons so far it wasn’t exploited. Gets our set pieces right and we might be back soon as I feel we would have won our first two games and with a hit of luck may have beaten England if we had our setpiece right (bare in mind Ireland had 2 line outs on the 5 metre line that where messed up)