waider

"There's nothing quite so sweet as a broken chariot" - Michael Lester, RTÉ man-on-the-spot in a pub somewhere in the heart of Donnybrook, home of Irish international rughby.

Well, it was great to see France actually play well for most of the game, and there's always a certain guilty pleasure to seeing anyone not just beat, but trounce the English rugby team, but it does mean we're probably out of the running for the Six Nations championship barring some sort of miracle next weekend. On the plus side, if the English team plays anything like this in Twickenham, we'll have an excellent chance at the Triple Crown.

Final scores for the weekend: France v Ireland, 43 - 31
Italy v England, 1e6 - 2 (consolation points)[1]
Wales v Scotland, some inept scoring - less scoring, but also inept

[1] Needlessly unfair. The Italians did a superb job in the first half, which they finished trailing by a mere point, before England did something or other I didn't see which involved scoring and converting a lot. I caught the end of the game; in the 82nd minute, the Italians (who had pulled back a try and conversion so they weren't trailing by quite so much) got a penalty at their own five-metre line; they chose, rather stupidly I thought, to run it instead of kicking it into the stands, the ball was intercepted by the opposition, and they went down another 7 points. Shame.

France 1, Ireland 0. On top of which Niall Quinn loses his license over a drink-driving issue. On the plus side, England 0, Northern Ireland 1; the cheer that greeted this news was one of the biggest of the night.

The big showdown. In the end, France triumphed 24-21 over England, which gave Ireland second place in the final standings. Woohoo! Final standings:

		Played	Score Difference	Points
1	France	5	84	10
2	Ireland	5	46	8
3	England	5	64	6
4	Wales	5	9	4
5	Italy	5	-110	2
6	Scotland	5	-93	0

WE WON! We beat the Best Team In The World™ on their HOME GROUND! GO US!

Well, this tells you all you need to know about the value of a British Knighthood.

The English guys stood in the wrong place, and then refused to move. Pretty much business as usual, I guess.

Me, discussing the Six Nations game this afternoon and in particular the nonsense at the start of the game.