That's The Easy Game Over - Now It Gets Harder

I TOOK some stick from many mates, after sticking my neck out and suggesting we could beat a poor England team on Saturday. At times, as we under-performed, conceded daft penalties and gave England field position, I questioned my own pre-match reading of the game, but -In Finn we trust – and in the end, ugly though it perhaps was, we got the win and retain possession of the Calcutta Cup. Job One in the Guinness Six Nations done, we move on.

This is where I came into international rugby, back in the late 1950s. The England of those far-off days were generally a bad lot. Sure, they had one or two great players: Peter Jackson, Richard Sharp, Dickie Jeeps, but, these class acts were too-often, surrounded by over-hyped big lumps. Fast forward 60 years and, plus ca change.

Any half-decent England team, given the amount of territory and possession they enjoyed on Saturday, I would have expected to beat us, with tries a plenty. But, what we saw at Murrayfield was not a great England side. Indeed, they men in white might be looking at a second straight fifth-place finish in the Guinness Six Nations, come the end of the tournament.

We had the quality players – Darcy Graham, Duhan van der Merwe, Finn Russell, Grant Gilchrist and Man of the Match Matt Fagerson. We also had the better team spirit, a refusal to crumble, even when things were not going well for us, and, we believed and got the result we wanted.

Ben White's dream debut on Saturday

 

And what about debutant Ben White? (pictured). Jilly Cooper's great anti-hero turned good guy, Rupert Campbell-Black was given a great line about timing a sportsman's retirement – reckoning it's the particular sportsman's hardest decision. Jim Telfer has joked, he really should have quit after his try against England in 1964, Ben White might be thinking this morning – yesterday was probably as good as it gets.

OK, Marcus Smith was very good for the Saxons; skipper Tom Curry led from the front, but, too-many of their supposed big names didn't perform. Indeed, even Maro Itoje, who so-often reserves his best form for this fixture, was largely anonymous.

We got few favours from referee Ben O'Keefe. Sure, he got the big decision right, around the Penalty Try, but, I was not impressed by his officiating at the few scrums, where he got one or two calls wrong.

But, I would not entirely blame Mr O'Keefe, Rugby Union's Laws are a shambles and, I again say, they need a start to finish re-write. Take that controversial call, when he penalised Stuart McInally for that “brake foot” offence, in his first scrum. By the letter of the Law, he was correct – it was a second such offence by the Scotland hooker. However, he had penalised two different hookers and it strikes me as unfair to penalise McInally for a prior technical offence, by George Turner. That aint right.

But, all that is history now, we've won, we move on to Cardiff, where we will be facing a wounded and angry Wales.

THE WELSH were simply out-classed in Dublin, where Ireland were, for my money, even-more-convincing winners than the 29-7. four tries to one, score line indicates. Ok, they had an awful lot of experienced players missing, but, if they play like that against us on Saturday, then we too should beat them easily.

Ireland struck early, got a foot on Welsh necks, so to speak and never let-up. Make no mistake, this is a terrific Irish side and their clash with France on Saturday might well be the game of the tournament.

IF ENGLAND cannot raise their game a lot from how they played against us on Saturday, then they will be in bother in Rome at the weekend. It took France a long time to subdue then beat them in Paris on Sunday, and the French are a much-better outfit than England.

Les Bleus' class acts: Dupont, Aldritt, Ntamack, Penaud and Woki all stood out in what was, after initial problems, a comfortable home win – which sets-up a potentially explosive clash with the equally in-form Irish this time out.

The 2022 version could be a Six Nations tournament to remember.

MASSIVE DISAPPOINTMENT – that's my take on Friday night's Under-20 Six Nations opener, between Scotland and Edinburgh. Sure, the bald fact is, England won 41-24. But, the reality is, there weren't that many points between the sides. Simply put, England took their chances, we didn't, don't forget, three of the English tries were long-distance affairs, scored when we were on the front foot. As so-often, our mistakes killed us.

As has so often been the case, when the two starting XVs were on the pitch, we were competitive, but, as soon as the replacements began to come into the game, England's greater depth showed and they pulled clear. It is not surprising that we do not have the depth of talent available to a neighbouring country, with ten times the population.

Young Henry Arundell, the England and London Irish full back looks like a player who will give us problems for the next decade or so. He oozed class, has pace to burn and he and Ethan Grayson of Northampton, look like class acts with big futures.

Maybe, with a bit more composure and a bit more luck, we could have snatched it. Certainly, while taking nothing away from the English win, we got little or nothing from a French referee who had clearly never heard of the Auld Alliance. At times, the England pack got away with murder, while we got pinged, but, that's not enws.

I didn't catch the identity of the main commentator, but, he was yet another in the long line of English talking heads you really, badly want to kick repeatedly in the goolies. The commentary was myopic and one-sided to the extent, it was almost Welsh.

Finally, fair play to Scotland captain Rhys Tait who, in his post-game interview, proved you can take the boy out of Hawick, but never Hawick out of the boy, as he dropped the F bomb in his opening sentence. And, well done too to Johnnie Beattie for his part in the commentary.

FINALLY, BBC Shortbread's Tom English is arguably the leading Sports Writer working in Scotland today. (In English's mind, there is no argument by the way). So, it was good, on Sunday, to see him getting something spectacularly wrong.

Schadenfreude it definitely was, but, I enjoyed English wondering why Joe Marler took that game-turning line-out throw, after Luke Cowan-Dickie was yellow carded. “Why didn't Eddie Jones bring on Jamie George at that point?” the smug Irishman wondered.

Because the Laws didn't allow him to ya tick Mick.

Hooking in a scrum is apparently a “specialist skill” - so you need a specialist hooker. Throwing-in at a line-out is not a specialist skill, therefore, anyone can do it. When I was playing, wingers threw in; then, there was a brief spell when scrum-halves did the job, before we settled down to the now common theme of hookers throwing-in.

I would say, given how every scrum-half now feeds the ball in squint, throwing-in at a line-out is a more specialised skill in the modern game.