yo!

still no parra for france

fofana on the wing when he's arguably the best 12 in the world


french coaches

Questionable decisions, but they need a result. As do Wales.

Fofana on the wing. WOW

So lets try and work out the reasoning behind that selection.

It can only be to exploit a perceived weakness in the wing defense for wales? But hey thats logical and the french well the real reason could be something like.... the camera angle is better and captures his good side. LOL

france clearly havent learnt anything from the italy game with their selection, pick the best players in their best positions its not that hard surely

especially with the strength in depth that france have in the backs surely they can find 2 world class wingers so they play fofana at 12

tally agree. not even a question of picking the best players. but its totally logical to pick a player and put that player in his best position. The french are nuts sometimes.

LOL and Michalak again. You would almost think that they want to lose.

is vincent clerc injured?

France in turmoil and a possible candidate for the Wooden Spoon? Just sticking that fantasy idea out there...

Not sure on Clerc, will have to find out but I presume he is.

Italy line up to play Scotland at Murrayfield: Italy: Andrea Masi (Wasps); Giovanbattista Venditti (Zebre), Tommaso Benvenuti (Treviso), Gonzalo Canale (La Rochelle), Luke McLean (Treviso); Luciano Orquera (Zebre), Tobias Botes (Treviso); Andrea Lo Cicero (Racing Metro), Leonardo Ghiraldini (Treviso), Martin Castrogiovanni (Leicester), Quintin Geldenhuys (Zebre), Francesco Minto (Treviso), Alessandro Zanni (Treviso), Simone Favaro (Treviso), Sergio Parisse (Stade Francais capt).
Replacements: Davide Giazzon (Zebre), Alberto De Marchi (Treviso), Lorenzo Cittadini (Treviso), Antonio Pavanello (Treviso), Paul Derbyshire (Treviso), Edoardo Gori (Treviso), Kristopher Burton (Treviso), Gonzalo Garcia (Zebre)

strong italy side, glad to see canale back in at 12, but would prefer gori to botes at 9

You fancy them to win on Saturday don't you mex?

if they play like they did last week they could beat almost anyone, i think it will be close but italy will win by 3

True they played very well last week - deserved it.

Arguably the Wooden Spoon decider Sat then the title decider Sun? Big weekend.

does anyone on here watch rugby league, ive always found with people its either one or the other, i very rarely meet people who like both, i only really watch union

Only tend to watch union but mainly the Six Nations, football or snooker normally takes over for me.

I have to say Mex i thought Botes had a really good game at 9 for Italy.

I'm embarrassed to admit but I went drinking with my rugby team on Saturday and couldn't even remember the second half of the England match....lightweight prop! Argh!

Should be on the match thread this weekend!

Never posted the Wales team but it's the first time I've seen it this morning. Warburton out injured so Justin Tipuric will come in.

We all got our predictions in ahead of this weekend's matches?

England have named the first XV (see below). I'm sad to see no Morgan in the squad at all, though not entirely surprised though I would have chosen Dylan Hartley and Manu Tuilagi (at 13) myself, also sad to see ben Foden not make the cut at all

If I were DBM I'd be mildly, though only mildly, encouraged - still no word on the Irish yet

England XV
England: Goode; Ashton, Barritt, Twelvetrees, Brown; Farrell, B Youngs; Marler, T Youngs, Cole, Launchbury, Parling, Haskell, Robshaw, Wood.

Replacements: Tuilagi, Flood, Care, M Vunipola, Hartley, Wilson, Lawes, Waldrom.

SARS you want the team I want! Despite him playing his best game (I think) for England last week I would also like Burns or Flood at FH. Seriously disappointed that Goode is in the team again. At least some solace can be found in the fact Waldrom isn't starting.
Manu must be livid with Barritt being ahead of him. The guy made or scored all our tries vrs New Zealand and is our one real source of attacking brilliance. All I can think is Ireland must be happy.

The centre pairing is interesting and I'd like to see Twelvetrees and Tuilagi, the former is being talked up as the next Will Greenwood and I think that's dangerous but his distribution is very good and I think a dangerous weapon against a somewhat lightweight centre and three quarters for Ireland.

If we can release Tuilagi into there, Ireland will really suffer - O'Driscoll is the only natural tackler - well he's a natural at everything, possibly including walking on water. We need to keep the ball out of the hands of O'Driscoll and Kearney, long kicking to the latter won't work - the ball will just come back ten feet over your head. if we can get it into touch, I think their line out can be targetted by Parling, Launchbury & Lawes.

I'd also like to see Burns, but at the expense of Flood rather than Farrell. In terms of our weak spots, we're not the quickest and Visser and Maitland showed that England can be put under pressure with those box kicks straight out of the loose - though I think Scotland were pretty good and a lot better than they've been given credit for. Also, Marler needs to keep his head on, if he can keep calm teh front row can match the Irish and I think the second row will win the day against the Donncha's in the Irish second row.

tuilagi missing from the start is a big blow for england, still cant believe foden hasnt made the squad even, id have him at 11 with either brown or goode at 15

Why no Tuilagi?

on the bench

Still struggling with his injury?