WALES CAPTAIN SAM Warburton just couldn’t bring himself to play down the significance of tonight’s Six Nations curtain raiser (KO 20.05).
England cross the Severn to open up the 2015 tournament in Cardiff with a great big bang.
The Millennium Stadium under lights is a daunting prospect at any time. But when the sides are due to meet in the upcoming World Cup and Wales still have some bloodlust left over from the 2013 trouncing dished out to their nearest and dearest, then England have reasons to be fearful.
Stuart Lancaster’s men did manage to see off Wales in Twickenham last time out. That, you sense, has only heightened The Need within the principality.
“The players and the way we prepare doesn’t change,” Warburton insisted at last week’s Six Nations launch in London. However, the mood of the nation certainly seeps in.
“All the hype that comes with it definitely does. Just from walking around in a supermarket, the streets of Cardiff, on your Twitter feeds or in the press; it definitely ramps up on Wales-England games.
“I’d say Wales-England or Wales-New Zealand are the two games there’s most interest in when those guys come to town.
“Even over Christmas people were talking about Wales-England. People asking me for tickets and I’m like: ‘I’m not even in the squad, I can’t sell you tickets – there’s one or two months to go before the game’. That’s the level of interest there is in this game.”
From early afternoon today the Championship feeling will be on display all over Cardiff. An evening game means post-match escape will be difficult by public transport. And the city centre stadium makes for an extremely condensed atmosphere throughout the day.
Wales come into the Championship emboldened by a long overdue win over a southern hemisphere giant – the 12–6 victory over the Springboks ending an unwanted streak of 22 matches without success against SANZAR.
Considering how well Wales have done without any form coming into past Six Nations, a result like that can surely only mean that all is rosy in Cymru:
“It’s definitely given us more momentum than it has in the past. I’m normally answering questions from here about why it hasn’t happened in the autumn and it’s quite nice to have that winning drought over.
“Without getting carried away, we want that to happen again in the next autumn series in 2016. England do it regularly, get a win over one of the three. We want to make it a regular habit. So even though it’s great for confidence and momentum we’re not getting ahead of ourselves.”
Nor is he allowing the squad get drunk on the memory of England’s last visit; when the sides faced off in a Championship decider. Wales needed to win by a convincing seven-point margin to wrestle the title away from England. They mercilessly dismantled the Chariot and sold it off in spare parts with a record 30 – 3 victory.
“I remember Ryan Jones speaking before the game – he was saying ‘just make sure you enjoy it, because it’s the type of game that might only happen once in your career’ and he was spot on.
“The chance of that happening again is extremely slim. Everyone who played in that game feels extremely lucky to have played. Fans in the stadium say the same thing, that they were privileged to be in the stadium that day. I just think it was one of those one-off freak fixtures which, from a Welsh perspective, was amazing to be involved in and was probably up there as a career highlight along with one or two other things.
Everyone wants it to happen again, but realistically it’s not going to happen. England are a quality side, so it will be a quality spectacle that’s for sure.”
Don’t count anything out. Wales have been lying in wait for this chance for months on end.
Wales
15. Leigh Halfpenny
14. Alex Cuthbert
13 Jonathan Davies
12. Jamie Roberts
11. George North
10. Dan Biggar
9. Rhys Webb
1. Gethin Jenkins
2. Richard Hibbard
3. Samson Lee
4. Alun Wyn Jones
5. Jake Ball
6. Dan Lydiate
7. Sam Warburton (capt)
8. Taulupe Faletau
Replacements:
16. Scott Baldwin
17. Paul James
18 Aaron Jarvis
19 Luke Charteris
20 Justin Tipuric
21. Mike Phillips
22. Rhys Priestland
23 Liam Williams
England
15. Mike Brown
14. Anthony Watson
13. Jonathan Joseph
12. Luther Burrell
11. Jonny May
10. George Ford
9. Ben Youngs
1. Joe Marler
2. Dylan Hartley
3. Dan Cole
4. David Attwood
5. George Kruis
6. James Haskell
7. Chris Robshaw (captain)
8. Billy Vunipola.
Replacements
16. Tom Youngs
17. Mako Vunipola
18. Kieran Brookes
19. Tom Croft
20. Nick Easter
21. Richard Wigglesworth
22. Danny Cipriani
23. Billy Twelvetrees.
