Nick Wright previews this weekend's clash between York City Knights and Hull FC
James Tompkinson reviews an excellent pre-season victory for the York City Knights against Yorkshire rivals Leeds Rhinos
James Tompkinson previews York City Knights' upcoming clash with Leeds Rhinos
Anthony Quinn previews Saturday's Four Nations match between England and Australia
After Saturday’s superb display, I doubt many will be calling England’s style of play “boring” for a while (they won 59-13). Whilst there were, admittedly, some holes in the Italian defence, England really controlled this game for the full 80 minutes, both shutting down Italy’s attack and taking advantage of every opportunity that they made. Man-of-the-match Chris Ashton excelled and has by now more than proved his worth as a unique finisher (he scored four tries).
Toby Flood, also, was once again fantastic. He’s shown real growth as a fly-half and is now the glue that holds this England backline together. He was also the mastermind of a substantial amount of the attack. With this performance, the English showed something of what this team’s ability can really produce (Mark Cueto even ran in a try!). Whilst they didn’t play that poorly, the Italians won’t be able to take many positives from their thorough defeat.
However much the BBC commentary team wanted me to think differently, I found the Wales vs. Scotland match on Saturday evening to be a boring and underwhelming encounter. Yes, the Welsh won (24-6), but their performance revealed almost zero progression from their lackluster showing last weekend. They’re are still relatively clueless in attack - their only move seems to still be ‘give the ball to Shane Williams’ - and their general play around the field is just kind of sloppy. In fact, if Scotland had played anything like they did against Ireland, this would’ve been a whole different story. Let’s hope both of these teams can improve their form in a fortnight’s time.
One team that did show great improvement is Ireland. The Irish game against Italy last week was disappointing, but this time round (in Dublin) they played an energetic, exciting and genuinely tense game against reigning champions France. The French may have come out the victors (22-25), but it was by no means an easy win.
Morgan Parra was on brilliant kicking form for France, as he sent over five penalties for his team. Ireland, though, showed up the French defensive line and ran in three tries. Unfortunately for them, however, it was their indiscipline that lost them the game, as they conceded a total of 16 penalties. At the end of the day, Marc Lieveremont’s men were simply a more professional outfit. The weekend’s results leave England at the top of the table, with them and France the only teams capable of pulling off a Grand Slam.
We’ve now got a two-week break from play and the Six Nations will resume on the 26th of February with (arguably the key match of the tournament) England vs. France (Saturday 26th, at 5pm), along with Italy vs. Wales (Saturday 26th, at 2.30pm) and Scotland vs. Ireland (Sunday 27th, at 3pm).
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