EVERY four years, the Rugby World Cup provides a handy yardstick for teams as they prepare for the RBS 6 Nations Championship. The beauty of it is that no matter how well or how badly they fared there, it is easy to come up with a positive spin on events.
Scotland can look at their performances in the autumn, particularly in their quarter-final against Australia, and honestly tell themselves: We can build on that. We did a lot right, and we know how to sort out the things that went wrong.
Ireland, for all that they were well beaten by Argentina in their quarter-final, can also take heart from the tournament. Early in the pool stage they were playing so well they began to be talked of as potential winners.
For England, France and Italy, an optimistic outlook is easy. We did not do ourselves justice at the World Cup, they will be able to say. We have what it takes to do better than that.
And Wales, who were excellent at times despite severe injury problems, have a simple, telling statistic on their side. In the year after the last two World Cups they have won a Grand Slam. Scotland were undoubtedly the most improved Six Nations team at the World Cup, reaching that last-eight match against the Wallabies after losing all five games in the 2015 Championship. But their games proved the saying that at the highest level in sport everything is decided by narrow margins. While Vern Cotter’s team lost to Australia by one point, and in controversial circumstances, they only reached that match by virtue of a three-point win over Samoa in their final pool game.
They looked vulnerable throughout that game against the Pacific islanders, as they did in the first halves against Japan and the United States, while they also lost to South Africa.
The statistics, then, are not hugely impressive: two defeats by the Southern Hemisphere giants, and three wins over the countries they were expected to beat. But the nature of the play provided more substantial grounds for optimism than the results on their own.
Scotland now have a world-class front row, a lock of real quality in Jonny Gray, and a match-winning openside flanker in John Hardie. As a result, they have a variety of game plans available to them, and no longer have to rely exclusively on trying to steer the action away from the set-piece because their opponents always have the edge there.
Behind the scrum, backs such as Finn Russell, Mark Bennett and Stuart Hogg combine creativity with a cutting edge. The days of Scotland going try-less for three or four games are long gone.
Bennett’s fitness, of course, has been a concern since he injured a shoulder while playing for Glasgow against Racing 92 this month. With Alex Dunbar and Peter Horne likely to miss out on the opening game against England, Cotter has real concerns when it comes to selecting a centre partnership.
Partly because of that, it may be that Scotland do not hit their best form until after the first two rounds of games. England at Murrayfield then Wales in Cardiff is a tough double-header to open with, but if they can come through that with their morale intact they should then be able to go to Rome and repeat the win they achieved in Turin during last summer’s World Cup warm-ups.
England coach Eddie Jones has the playing resources that are the envy of not just Cotter, but nearly every other nation; however, the key question is how long it will take him to learn how to marshal them to best effect. The irreverent Australian is capable of provoking a real culture clash with the conservative forces that still hold sway within Twickenham, and his selection of Dylan Hartley as captain looks like a high-risk strategy given the hooker’s woeful disciplinary record. Jones has already deferred to his employers’ traditional preferences by insisting that his team will be based on a strong pack, but he will need to do more than perfect the forwards’ line-out drives if his team are to thrive against more dynamic opponents.
Like England, France have a vast number of players from which to select their national squad. Like Jones, Guy Noves is a vastly experienced head coach who will aim to restore the solid virtues that Philippe Saint-Andre’s side forgot at the World Cup. He transformed Toulouse into the best club side in Europe during the early years of the Heineken Cup, as well as achieving domestic dominance with 10 titles.
Under Noves, France are likely to play a slightly more structured game, which may reduced the entertainment value of their matches. More importantly, he seems guaranteed to reduce the error count and eliminate the mood of demoralisation which dogged them under Saint-Andre, whose highest-placed Six Nations finish in four years at the helm was fourth.
Wales are the most mature team in the championship, having been under Warren Gatland since 2007 and grown in stature almost every year. They overcame real difficulties with injuries to make it through to the World Cup quarter-finals at the expense of England, and have the talent and the attitude required to become champions this year. While Wales are either at their peak or possibly still a little shy of it, Ireland are arguably just past their best. The loss of Brian O’Driscoll and Paul O’Connell has to be keenly felt, and the relatively poor form of their provincial teams in Europe is an ominous sign. Having said that, rumours of their demise have been overstated, and if they can recapture their best displays at the World Cup they could push the Welsh hard for the title.
Alas, the same could not be said for Italy. They got the better of Scotland last season to avoid the wooden spoon, but they lost to Cotter’s team twice before the World Cup and struggled to beat Canada and Romania to finish third in their pool. Veteran coach Jacques Brunel will step down at the end of the championship, and he is far more likely to exit with a whimper than with a bang.
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