Are the Scots championship contenders?
IAN MADIGAN ON Virgin Media was the most recent Irish rugby pundit to draw the ire of online Scottish rugby fandom when he suggested that, while leading 27-0 at half-time of their Six Nations opener against Wales in Cardiff, Scotland would have been thinking, ‘We’re never going to have a better chance to win a Grand Slam.’
"I think less of Scotland after Saturday.
— Virgin Media Sport (@VMSportIE) February 4, 2024
"Scotland are fragile."
Our pundits don't think much of Scotland, despite their Cardiff victory. #WALvSCO | #GuinnessSixNations pic.twitter.com/L29sDgcgdx
In Ireland, there remains a perception of this Scottish team as being prone to talk themselves up only to fall hilariously short of their own expectations. But most Scottish supporters believe this perception to be an invention of the Irish media, which they reckon takes a perverse glee on punching down on their humble side.
Allow me to break this vicious cycle as a member of that media and talk Scotland up — or, at least, talk up their chances of launching a proper title tilt in this year’s Six Nations.
Gregor Townsend’s side are not great. Indeed, there are times — as we saw against Ireland in a do-or-die clash at the World Cup — when they’re not even close to being good. But with Ireland having beaten France and, crucially, kept them pointless in Marseille, and with Scotland having limped over the line in Cardiff to end a 22-year hoodoo, there is a more than decent chance both sides could wind up meeting for a Slam at the Aviva Stadium on St Patrick’s weekend.
Greater tests than Wales lie ahead for Scotland, sure, but they have recent history on their side. They’ve beaten today’s opponents France five times in their last seven meetings at Murrayfield, and this travelling French outfit — almost out of championship contention already having failed to pick up a bonus point of any kind against Ireland — could prove more vulnerable than most.
The Scots would be well within their rights to fancy what the bookies would still see as a minor upset in Edinburgh today.
England are next up, again at Murrayfield. The Scots have won four and drawn one of their last six meetings with the old enemy at all venues, winning the last two at home. Barring disaster today, they will be favoured to keep that trend going against Steve Borthwick’s more transitional side next week.
That would leave only Italy in Rome to set up a mouth-watering showdown with Ireland and, let’s be honest, this is exactly where the Scots would most likely make a balls of it. Still, depending on how the bonus-point situation shakes out in the coming weeks, it seems more likely than unlikely from this juncture that Scotland will land into Dublin on the final weekend with a championship still to play for.
Winning it would be another matter, but an Ireland-Scotland title decider would make for a fun week of punditry and online discourse at the very least.
Will France rebound or down tools?
In a scene in Netflix’s Full Contact series, Fabien Galthié told his French players that if they did exactly what their coaches told them, they would win games.
Galthié and assistant coach Shaun Edwards demand the absolute trust of their players and, since 2020, they have received it. But has that trust really been repaid?
France, mostly adherent to their coaches’ data-driven and kick-heavy gameplan, didn’t win last year’s Six Nations. And they didn’t win their home World Cup, either, towards which they had focused all of their efforts for five years. And they’re probably not going to win this Six Nations either, having been minced in Marseille by Ireland who kept them bonus point-less. All they’ve gotten for their troubles was a Grand Slam in 2022 and a load of grief since.
So, why would they listen to Fabien Galthié or his coaches now?
As we saw with Joe Schmidt and Ireland in 2019, and more recently with Eddie Jones and England, coaches as dogmatic, demanding and domineering as Galthié have a shelf life of five to six years before things turn sour. For Galthié, this is Year 5 (or Year 6 if you include his first year as assistant to Jacques Brunel), and it could be time to check the lid.
It’s tough to gain the emotional buy-in from players to the extent that Galthié, Edwards and co. managed to do it throughout the past World Cup cycle — but it’s very easy to lose it.
France’s selection for today’s trip to Scotland, which includes only two changes to the side hammered by Ireland last Friday (Cameron Woki replaces the suspended Paul Willemse; Louis Bielle-Biarray replaces Yoram Moefana), is a show of faith in his players from Galthié. Whether or not it will be reciprocated remains to be seen.
Even if France pitch up and earn what would be only a third victory at Murrayfield in eight visits, it won’t necessarily mean that the French coaches are on sure footing. The jersey can be fuel enough to provoke something guttural from Les Bleus, who reached the 2011 Rugby World Cup final while stonewalling head coach Marc Lièvremont.
But if Finn Russell and the Scots have their way with France to the same degree as Ireland did in Marseille, we’ll have a more concrete picture of Galthié’s standing in his own dressing room.
Gatland does his best to stir the pot on quiet England-Wales week
"I just think that it's showing how proud you are to be Welsh. If you don't want to be Welsh then p*** off.”
— Rugby on TNT Sports (@rugbyontnt) February 8, 2024
🏴 Wales Head Coach Warren Gatland addressed rumours of any bad blood after Immanuel Feyi-Waboso declared for England. #GuinnessM6N pic.twitter.com/Xj6FfRw7gM
Without his old sparring partner Eddie Jones to trade jabs with this week, Warren Gatland was the picture of boredom as he box-ticked his way through a press conference ahead of his side’s trip to Twickenham.
His eyes lit up only when Immanuel Feyi-Waboso’s name was invoked, and specifically when he was asked about Neil Jenkins’ reaction to Feyi-Waboso’s declaration for England ahead of the championship — a scene which he had previously described in his Telegraph column.
“We haven’t even spoken about him,” Gatland said of England’s Cardiff-born wing Feyi-Waboso. “He’s made his decision so good luck to him. There’s been no mention of his name whatsoever.
“Jenks has made that comment in jest to me in the room. I said: ‘He’s made a decision to play for England,’ and Jenks — being the ultra-proud Welshman as he is — kind of said… ‘If he doesn’t want to play for Wales, then bugger him.’
“I love that. It’s just showing how proud you are to be Welsh. If you don’t want to be Welsh, then piss off.”
It should be noted that the previously uncapped Feyi-Waboso wouldn’t have been able to represent Wales while playing for Exeter Chiefs anyway — and he only plays for Exeter Chiefs because he couldn’t get a spot in Medicine at Cardiff University despite having the requisite secondary school qualifications.
As such, he is an England player due to a combination of ancestry and the failings of the Welsh education system, rather than ‘not wanting to be Welsh.’
Feyi-Waboso’s introduction off the bench today is one of the few aspects of the game that we know for certain will prove interesting.
Really, anything is possible otherwise, with a transitional England opening as 10-point favourites over the even less experienced Wales.