HELLO WEEKEND, GOODBYE sunny weather.
And good riddance too, because we don’t need that sunshine raiding through our drawn curtains and washing out all the vibrant greens, blues, blacks and yellows that will be on our TV and laptop screens this weekend.
Cancel all your plans for Saturday and schedule meal-times according to this feast of live rugby.
Saturday
You look like an early riser, especially when there’s top notch Super Rugby to be watched over your Coco Pops.
The final round of Super XV fixtures has already begun, but the best is still ahead of us and it’s on Sky Sports 1. Dan Carter and Richie McCaw will play their last game for Canterbury Crusaders away to the Brumbies at 6.35 AM.
Straight after that at 8.35 AM is the mouthwatering clash between leaders Hurricanes (complete with Conrad Smith, Julian Savea and Dane Coles) and Sonny Bill Williams’ Waikato Chiefs.
After that, you can leave the TV on for Waratahs v (for now) Quade Coopers’s Reds, but you better have the laptop open to keep tabs on how Ireland Women’s Sevens squad are getting on in the first leg of their Rugby Europe Grand Prix in Kazan.
Ireland’s kick-off times will be at 9.28 AM (v Spain), 11.22 AM (v France) and 2.22 PM (v Ukraine), and you can either watch them right here. Or on Rugby Europe’s Daily Motion channel here.
Make sure nobody’s clogging up the Wifi after lunch, because while the Women take on Ukraine, Allen Clarke’s Emerging Ireland team will already be under way against Emerging Italy in the Tbilisi Cup. It’s not on TV either, but you will be able to watch all the action unfold via the Georgian rugby union’s website from 2.00 PM.
Here’s the link directly to the feed.
You still want more? Head back to Sky Sports 5 for Bulls v Cheetahs at 4pm and once you’re done with that there’ll just be enough time to see some daylight before the Top14 final kicks off. Because when you’ve watched over 12 hours of rugby, you don’t want to miss the game that actually has a trophy riding on it.
It’s Clermont Auvergne v Stade Francais and it will be live from the Stade de France at 8.00 PM on Sky Sports 3.
Sunday
You don’t want to go cold turkey after such an intense day of screen action, so keep an eye out for that link to Kazan as Ireland Women’s 7s (hopefully) enter the play-offs in the Europe Rugby Grand Prix.
Ireland men’s Sevens will also be in action under the guise of Wolfhounds in the third weekend of the GB7s in Colwyn Bay in Wales. You’ll just have to hear about that through the grapevine though.
