Bastareaud Out Of SA Tour
The Springboks will not have to face powerful centre Mathieu Bastareaud this weekend after he withdrew from France’s tour to South Africa and Argentina.
The 22-year-old Stade Francais powerhouse injured his hamstring in training last Friday and is replaced in the touring squad by uncapped Bayonne centre Lionel Mazars.
The controversial centre – who made a sensational return to the France team during the Six Nations following the scandal he was involved in down in New Zealand – is the third big name player to pull out of the France squad.
Imanol Harinordoquy and Yannick Jauzion have both already withdrawn.
“It’s unfortunate for Mathieu, but injury is a part of our sport and I wish him a speedy recovery” said coach Marc Lièvremont.
With thanks to Frenchrugbyclub.com
Six Nations In Brief
Wales vs Italy in the Six Nations.
The country went from the high of beating Scotland to away defeats in Paris and Cardiff, the schedule not really giving them a chance to kick on, while the centre went from his opening games, when he was unstoppable, to being put in his place by a quite inspired Mike Tindall.
Who’d have thought it?
There’s no doubting the spirit of Italy.
As long as they have the Bergamasco boys it seems they will go down snapping at their opponents, even if their limbs have been removed. Or rather, because their limbs have been removed. I quite like the notion of a pair of Bergamasco dentures chasing Wales off the park.
With the game long lost, Mirco went for Mike Phillips who, luckily, is one of the game’s more stoical characters (not), while Mauro drove in from the side of a ruck and upended James Hook.
I know we are meant to tut-tut and say how irresponsible it all is, but I thought there was something noble about the brothers’ indomitable spirit.
France plodded across their grand slam line, appearing very English alongside England who were positively French until the rain fell.
Unfortunately, this was not long into the first half and it was the kicking game of France that kept them in the right areas of the field to deny Jonny Wilkinson from a drop at goal.
His one penalty, the single score of the second half, was a thing of beauty and the whole England performance, in isolation, would have been interpreted as encouraging were it not for the fact that it was the end part of a sequence.
Perhaps the only thing it revealed more clearly than the one-off performance of Tindall was that Martin Johnson might end up with a winning team in spite of his selection methods.
It’s all very well saying that the right to wear an England shirt has to be earned the hard way, or at least the expensive way – there being no such thing as a cheap cap – but it really shouldn’t have been too exacting to sit down a little sooner and suggest that Ben Foden might be given a go.
Johnson’s stubbornness, like the Bergamascos’, is a quality, but it does require a bit of refining.
Somebody is going to have to introduce the England manager to the notion of compromise. Good luck to the Acas rep who lands that brief.
If England didn’t quite manage to upset France’s grand slam Scotland rained on Ireland’s triple crown parade at Croke Park. This wasn’t quite the farewell to the stadium that Ireland had planned.
But the Scottish lineout was majestic, confirming its place at the top of the efficiency league in the Six Nations, and Johnnie Beattie underlined his place as a most forceful runner.
Anybody that upstaged Imanol Harinordoquy as a No8 had quite a championship.
The result showed that between Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England – and I’m going to throw France in too because England and Wales could both have beaten the grand slammers – there is precious little.
This means that either we are all milling around in our own pool of European development without finding the outlet that leads to the greater waters of the Southern Ocean, or it shows that we are sort of swirling our way forward in some sort of waltz, bodies spinning upwards or being twirled back, but generally progressing.
The Six Nations is a pond or a barn dance.
Courtesy of The Guardian
Wales To Be Lashed In Training
The Wales Team
Following their 27-12 humbling by Ireland in the Six Nations, Wales are going to suffer previously unheard-of pain of training this week.
Coach Warren Gatland is set to wield the axe after Wales’ third loss of the campaign – after falling to England and France – but first he’s going to inflict some punishment on his under-performing squad.
“They will go through some pain at training that they probably haven’t experienced before,” Gatland confirmed.
“We’ve tried to have a little bit more leadership in terms of the players developing the game. Unfortunately we haven’t developed enough in that area. And the way this group of players seem to respond is hard work, being very much coach-led at the moment. So for me it’s [about] putting the players under a lot of pressure at training and if you make mistakes or errors then there’ll be a few punishments.
“Players need to go through a little bit of pain because we’re hurting. The coaching staff are hurting, the players are hurting and we’ve got to get a response and a performance on Saturday that reflects how important this is to us.”
Even if they beat Italy at the Millenium Stadium on Saturday, Wales can now finish no higher than fourth. That means for the ninth time in 11 Six Nations seasons, Wales will not secure a top-three place (the other two times they won the tournament.)
And if Scotland can draw or win away to Ireland, the losers of the Wales-Italy clash will take home the wooden spoon.
Springbok coach Peter de Villiers will be keeping more than half an eye on that game, because Wales’ next Test match will be against the Boks on 5 June, and Italy will be in SA for Tests on 19 and 26 June.
Ditch Jonny, Save Yourselves
Jonny Wilkinson Has Not Helped England's Awful Ways
If you’re England, it’s probably beginning to feel like you’ve just rolled over and continued a bad rugby nightmare. A narrow win over Italy has done little to quell fears of complete collapse – as this insightful piece from the UK Guardian shows:
Everything is relative. Thank goodness we can all sit around debating how awful England were, rather than await a chilling medical bulletin from a Cardiff hospital. Let us be eternally grateful that the Scotland wing Thom Evans did not, after all, suffer a more serious injury at the Millennium Stadium. Were he still lying motionless in bed with no feeling in his arms and legs, England’s shortcomings in Rome would be less than irrelevant.
Happily the medics say Evans should make a full recovery. Unhappily for Martin Johnson, the Six Nations Championship table may imply a blooming red rose but anyone who watched the 80-minute bore-athon in the Stadio Flaminio knows better.
Subtract Welsh generosity and Italian mediocrity from the equation and England could easily still be searching for their first win.
Maybe it would have done them good to lose to the Azzurri on Sunday, if only to inject more realism into the post-match platitudes. Maybe, behind closed doors this week, tough words will be spoken and even tougher decisions taken.
As things stand, though, England risk the steepest of descents. Even if they do emerge from their weekend torpor to see off Ireland and Scotland, they face a total wipeout at the hands of a resurgent France in Paris unless there is a radical change of tactics.
Should England finish second in the championship playing like zombies, it will confirm every southern hemisphere doubt about the tournament’s overall quality.
Sure, it did Johnson no favours that the Wales-Scotland game was such a humdinger or that France made such mincemeat of the grand slam champions. The snapshot of the Six Nations so far was Mathieu Bastareaud’s offload out of Brian O’Driscoll’s tackle for Clément Poitrenaud’s try. Talk about the changing of the guard.
Yet anyone who witnessed the Scots playing with massive precision, pride and passion, albeit without ultimate reward, could not fail to wonder why England seem incapable of doing likewise on a consistent basis. Dan Parks, the much-maligned Glasgow fly-half, had the game of his life while the so-called Killer Bs – Brown, Beattie and Barclay – were similarly outstanding.
The difference was that Scotland were brimful of intent and purpose while England again spent a large chunk of their 80 minutes painting by numbers.
To blame it all on Jonny Wilkinson would be harsh. He has bailed out his country around the world and his late drop goal on Sunday did so again. Slow ball can also make mortals of the greatest playmakers. Sometimes, though, you just wish the coaches would temporarily hand the goalkicking duties to someone else and tell Wilkinson enough is enough.
Either play flat on the gainline and take responsibility for putting your midfield into space, or accept the consequences at the next selection meeting. If the great man is merely playing to orders, rip them up and start again. If he cannot – or will not – take that giant leap of the imagination, it is time for someone else – Toby Flood? Shane Geraghty? Charlie Hodgson? Danny Cipriani? – to start at No10.
It is no good, either, wibbling on about lingering stomach bugs. If people were not fully fit, they should not have been starting. England’s issue is not physical but psychological. They talk a lot about freedom but play with the zest of men serving a life sentence.
A lot of visiting teams struggle to break down Italy but at least they set off with clear conviction. When opponents do not gift them points, England look painfully short of ideas and, as a direct result, invite trouble upon themselves.
Where are the forwards queuing up, like Beattie and Brown, to storm the gainline? Apart from Nick Easter and Simon Shaw, neither of whom is a spring chicken, there remains scant ball-carrying oomph beyond the set pieces.
Dan Cole is still settling into Test rugby but Lewis Moody, for all his selfless commitment and restart gymnastics, is not a creative openside in the mould of Martyn Williams. Without any momentum, Danny Care is effectively neutered and Wilkinson is even more inclined to retreat back into the pocket.
This, in turn, renders England predictable in attack and overreliant on the boot. It might win them the odd Six Nations dogfight but not a World Cup next year.
The missing ingredient, in short, is dynamism. It comes in many forms, not least leadership. If England really meant all that stuff about allowing players freedom of expression they have to replace words with action. If they risk defeat in pursuit of greater self-knowledge, so be it.
When Nick Mallett spoke of disappointment in Italy’s dressing room at not having beaten England, he was simply stating the obvious.
There will be further trouble ahead unless Johnson’s men heed such warnings. Perhaps England should reflect on the misfortune of Evans, a good friend of James Haskell’s, and remind themselves that life is not a rehearsal. Armed with a fresh perspective, they might just feel empowered to ditch their negative ways and spectacularly sidestep their critics.
With thanks to The Guardian
Welsh Flanker Arrested After Scottish Win
Wales flanker Andy Powell faces an uncertain future in the international game after being arrested in the early hours of Sunday morning for allegedly taking and driving away a golf buggy.
Just hours after his team’s dramatic victory over Scotland, the 28-year-old Cardiff Blues forward was arrested with another man at services off junction 33 of the M4 in the Vale of Glamorgan.
Investigations are ongoing, but with Wales coach Warren Gatland a stickler for discipline, the player’s inclusion in the squad for the game against France a week on Friday, must surely be in doubt.
The pair’s alleged high jinks put a further dampener on a match already overshadowed by serious injuries to Scotland’s Thom Evans and Chris Paterson. Evans, the 24-year-old Glasgow Warriors‘ wing underwent surgery on his neck at the University of Wales Hospital, Cardiff, on Saturday night after a sickening collision with the Wales full-back Lee Byrne. Paterson, the 31-year-old Edinburgh full-back, suffered a damaged kidney and like Evans, will remain in hospital until deemed well enough to travel.
Gatland and team manager Alan Phillips chose not to comment on the matter last night, but a statement from the Welsh Rugby Union read: “The WRU is aware of a police investigation into an incident involving the player Andy Powell and is monitoring its progress.
“The national squad views matters of player conduct extremely seriously. Members of the national squad management will formally speak to the player before any futher statement is issued.
“The WRU has advised the player on the opportunities he can consider for legal representation at this stage.”
South Wales Police confirmed that one of the two arrested men failed a breath test, but it is not known which one of the men this was. No charges have yet been brought.
It is understood the golf buggy was taken from the Vale Hotel, Golf and Spa Resort in the Vale of Glamorgan where the Wales team stayed before and after the match on Saturday. A spokesman for the hotel said they could not comment as a police investigation was ongoing.
Thanks to the telegraph.co.uk
Loading ...
.PNG){kind=icon}
