GREEN SHOOTS
It’s mid-term report time and Ireland and Les Bleus are top of the class — but Scots need extra tuition while Eddie Jones continues to be a troublemaker
AFTER a fortnight of high drama and two pulsating Six Nations rounds, we roll into a down week, a return to domestic action and a chance to take stock as the business end of the championship looms large.
As ever, the globe’s oldest rugby tournament never fails to deliver. There’s been off-field controversy, player unrest, brilliant skills and brain fades... and that’s just Scotland!
There was so much uncertainty about how this Six Nations would play out. There were four new coaches in Andy Farrell, Wayne Pivac, Fabien Galthie and Franco Smith and plenty of new captains and players as well.
With the first fortnight of action done and dusted, however, things are starting to take shape.
Here, Sportsmail runs through the mid-term report on all six participants.
IRELAND
Terms such as ‘recovery’ and ‘resurgence’ have been doing the rounds in recent days. Ireland have not quite returned to the boom times of 2018, but Saturday’s four-try trouncing of Wales was a massive step in the right direction.
There was a genuine fear that this squad – the majority of which were on duty throughout the worrying campaign of 2019 and subsequent World Cup implosion – were in an irreversible slide and Farrell’s new coaching ticket, for all the positive noises about change and new routines etc, were not equipped to halt it.
There was also criticism, a lot of it warranted, that Ireland’s new head coach was repeating the mistakes of the past and putting his trust in a clutch of experienced campaigners who had failed to fire consistently in a green jersey for the best part of 18 months.
Farrell and his under-fire squad have responded with an unbeaten start to this campaign. They sit joint-top with France and travel to Twickenham in two weeks with a Triple Crown, Championship and Grand Slam all still on offer. The likes of Conor Murray, Johnny Sexton, Peter O’Mahony and CJ Stander have stepped up while Farrell has infused the squad with exciting young talent such as Ronan Kelleher, Caelan Doris and Max Deegan. The form of Jordan Larmour and Andrew Conway has been rewarded while Ulster’s inform full-back Will Addison is primed to make an impact later in the tournament.
A big win can do wonders for morale and Ireland have some much-needed momentum as well. England on their home turf won’t be easy, but Ireland will fancy it. Remaining fixtures: England (away) Feb 23, Italy (home) March 7, France (away), March 14
FRANCE
After a barren decade, there was a sense that Les Bleus, for so long a sleeping giant in this tournament, were about to wake from their slumber. Fabien Galthie, an icon of the French game, had been appointed as head coach and the former scrumhalf set out his stall by placing his faith in a youthful squad with a new captain in 26-yearold Toulon flanker Charles Ollivon, who had only 11 caps to his name prior to this championship.
That sense of excitement could be felt in the Stade de France in the hours before kick-off on that opening weekend. England, the World Cup finalists, were subsequently blown off the park by the rampant hosts during a furious first half.
An early try from Vincent Rattez and a brace from Ollivon saw France surge into a 24-0 lead.
England wing Jonny May almost single-handedly sparked a late revival but France held on for a huge win and a major statement.
Galthie’s authority, a defensive system engineered by Shaun Edwards, the calm leadership of Ollivon and the sheer brilliance of Antoine Dupont at scrum-half were the highlights of that first-round win.
The only worry was a fall-off in the final 20 minutes and it would prove the case again last weekend against Italy. Having built a 28-10 lead on the hour mark, this France side once again went off the boil, conceding two late tries as the Azzurri mounted a late fightback.
France have looked awesome at times but they have also looked vulnerable and there is a nagging suspicion that for all the talents of Bernard le Roux, Gregory Alldritt, Dupont, Romain Ntamack, Virimi Vakatawa and Teddy Thomas, they still don’t look fit enough to go the distance. They have two weeks to solve that issue. Remaining fixtures: v Wales (away) Feb 22, v Scotland (away) March 8, v Ireland (home) March 14
WALES
Going into their first Six Nations in 12 years without Warren Gatland at the helm was always going to be a steep learning curve for this Wales team and so it has proved.
A facile 42-0 win over Italy in Cardiff on the opening weekend was followed by a reality check in Dublin, Wayne Pivac’s side going down 24-14 in Dublin.
Depth has always been an issue with Wales. The creative spark and leadership of Liam Williams and Jonathan Davies is already being felt after just two rounds. Still, there is a sense that Pivac and assistant coach Stephen Jones are in the early stages of evolving Wales from the hardnosed outfit under Gatland into a more free-flowing, attack-minded team in the mould of Pivac’s allaction Scarlets that took the Pro14 by storm a few years ago.
They could have a major say in this tournament yet, with France arriving in Cardiff in two weeks’ time. Remaining fixtures: v France (home) Feb 22, v England (away) March 7, v Scotland (home) March 14
ENGLAND
There’s just never a dull moment when Eddie Jones is around is there?
The wily Australian promised ‘absolute brutality’ when England rolled into Paris in round one. Eddie’s men, who had stormed to the World Cup final just three months previously, were subsequently beaten out the gate.
Saturday’s 13-6 in Murrayfield, an absolute slugfest in the driving wind and rain, has steadied the ship somewhat.
The main issue for England at present is their power deficit. Simply put, when the brothers Vunipola and Manu Tuilagi are on the field then this England squad are a different proposition. Without that trio of Pacific Island powerhouses, they are nowhere near as threatening. All three were fit last season, a very rare occurrence, and England looked like world beaters. Now, Billy Vunipola is absent due to another broken arm, his fourth such injury in two years, but Mako Vunipola and Tuilagi are poised to feature against Ireland in Twickenham. After two away trips, England will relish running out on Twickenham for the first time since their loss to the Springboks in that ill-fated World Cup final in Japan. And they are still loaded with quality operators in Jamie George, Maro Itoje, Sam Underhill, Tom Curry and Owen Farrell. But they lack the gain-line busting power of last year. Jones (above) should make up for that with a few well-placed soundbites next week. Remaining fixtures: v Ireland (home) Feb 23, v Wales (home) March 7, v Italy (away) March 14
SCOTLAND
Scotland fans may have thought that things couldn’t possibly get any worse after that utter shambles of a World Cup. Crashing out at the pool stages after losses to Ireland and Japan was only the beginning. What followed was a fine for ill-judged comby ments CEO Mark Dodson in the midst of Typhoon Hagibis before revelations that the same boss in question had doubled his salary to almost £1million despite a shocking year for Scottish rugby, on and off the pitch.
There followed Finn Russell (right) leaving the Scotland camp, in a throwback to Roy Keane’s exile in Saipan, on the eve of their clash with Ireland. Russell has since given a Sunday newspaper interview stating that his relationship with head coach Gregor Townsend has reached toxic levels.
Despite all that, the Scots have not been far off. But for Stuart Hogg’s calamity, they may have got a result in Dublin while Saturday’s Calcutta Cup clash descended into trench warfare in the atrocious conditions. They travel to Rome in the third round with their season on the line.
Remaining fixtures: v Italy (away) Feb 22, v France (home) March 8, v Wales (away) March 14
ITALY
In his first championship in charge, Franco Smith, the former Treviso out-half and head coach, inherited a squad that made some strides under Conor O’Shea, before lapsing back into bad habits. The scale of the challenge facing the South African was laid out in the first round when they were demolished by Wales in Cardiff. They were looking like cannon fodder again in Paris last weekend before a final-quarter fightback gave the scoreline some respectability. They host the Scots next up and it looks like their only chance of securing a first Six Nations win since 2015.
Remaining fixtures: v Scotland (home) Feb 22, v Ireland (away) March 7, v England (home) March 14