Italy and Scotland fought out a close match in Rome. It wasn’t great rugby, but the two sides were fairly evenly matched. Italy came out ahead by 16-12, primarily because they were able to score a try while Scotland, despite threatening a lot, didn’t manage to do so.

England were a lot better against Ireland than they were in Italy, but still failed to sparkle, or win. The match statistics tell a fascinating story. England dominated possession, especially in the second half when they had twice as much ball as the Irish. Ireland made 99 tackles during the game, and missed only one. England only made 30 tackles, but missed seven. The Irish wings scored three tries – two for Tommy Bowe and one for Keith Earls. England scored only one try, and that by a prop forward from close range. So yes, Ireland sat back and defended for most of the the game, but they did so very well, and when they did get a chance they were ruthless. And that’s why they ended up winners by 20-16.

France came to Cardiff this evening with a game plan. For the first forty minutes they looked like a cultured Premiership soccer club playing the away leg of a Champion’s League tie. “We know,” they said, “that you are under pressure to win. Our defense is solid, come at us.” So Wales did, and the defense was solid. The longer it held, the more likely it was that Wales would become desperate and try something ambitious, and make a mistake. Mistakes could then be punished, and points scored. Simples, as Aleksandr the meercat would say.

So it was that France went in at half time with a comfortable 20-0 lead. That came from two interception tries, and two penalties given away well inside the Welsh half. In other words, Wales had given France all of those points. France had “won” them simply by being patient and resolute in defense, and mercilessly efficient when pouncing on errors.

The second half was very different. During the break Warren Gatland had clearly reminded the Welsh side that you have to earn the right to go wide. It is just like American football – you can’t throw the ball if you have no running game, because the defense can pack their deep coverage. In the second half Wales ramped up the running game, taking the ball forward close to the ruck and sucking French defenders in. They camped in the French half. France started to make mistakes. Penalties were given, points came.

And then, the moment of opportunity. With the French defense pulled out of shape again, Wales flung the ball wide left. Shane Williams used all of his former scrum half skills to put Halfpenny in the clear on the wing. Stephen Jones slotted the difficult conversion. The lead was down to 7 points, and France had lost their scrum half and goal kicker, Morgan Parra, to the sin bin. If Wales could just capitalize on the man advantage the game was there for the taking.

Instead they blew it. Ten minutes passed, and the only points scored were a penalty to France. The Welsh tactics were better in the second half, but their game was just as error-strewn. Lee Byrne missed two simple kicks to touch that would have given Wales superb attacking lineout position. Excellent attacking opportunities were squandered. Silly penalties were given away.

Shane Williams, on his 33rd birthday, did manage a try to pass Gareth Edwards’ record as Wales’s most prolific try scorer. And Stephen Jones passed Neil Jenkins’ record for total points in the championship. But it is not a day either player will want to remember. Just as against England, they could have won the game, and they threw it away with silly errors.

Well, that was a thoroughly uninspired performance by England. In the end they won 17-12, but the result was in doubt for much of the match, and had Lewis Moody been yellow-carded for taking McLean out in the air, which he very easily could have been, Italy might have won the game. (If I were a referee I’d yellow-card Moody for breathing on the grounds that’s he’s probably up to no good by doing so, but he’s been a great servant to England over the years by erring just on the side of legality most of the time, or at least not getting caught.)

Italy played a much more expansive and ambitious game than they had done in Dublin last weekend. They don’t really have the talent to break down England’s defense, but they did worry them, and they showed far more enterprise than their opponents who, for the most part, were happy to sit back and play ping pong, punting the ball back and fore down field.

How bad were England? Well, last weekend, against a much better Welsh side, they scored 17 points while Alyn Wyn Jones was sin binned. Today, the only points they scored during Alessandro Castrogiovanni’s absence were the three from the penalty awarded for his original infringement. Italy, on the other hand, scored three while a man down and could easily have got more. Jonny Wilkinson and Dylan Hartley had particularly bad games, but the whole England side were uninspired. They will have to do much better than that against Ireland in two weeks time.

During the first half of the game against Wales Scottish winger, Thom Evans (brother of try scorer Max and cousin of BBC DJ Chris) was stretchered off after going head first into a tackle. The report during the game was that he had a leg injury, but the BBC now reports that he is in hospital with a “very serious” back injury. I’m sure all Welsh fans will join me in wishing Thom a speedy recovery.

Update: The latest news is that Thom has had surgery on his neck and is now able to move his arms and legs.

I’m sure it is very convenient for the Welsh Rugby Union to have sponsorship from Cardiff’s local brewery. However, I am concerned that all this talk of “Brains” around the team may have attracted the wrong sort of attention; beings for whom the word “Brains” does not suggest intelligence, or even beer, but rather food. Why do I think that? Well it is clear from today’s performance that while the Welsh team all have “Brains” written across their chests, they have none whatsoever in their heads.

Last weekend a few moments of stupidity cost Wales the game against England. This weekend the disease has spread, and we were witness to 74 minutes of the worst rugby I have seen from a Welsh side in a long time. Passes were dropped, penalties were given away, tackles were missed, the error count was phenomenal. Despite dominating territory, Wales went in at the half 18-9 behind.

To be fair to Scotland, they played with a lot more determination and enthusiasm than their counterparts. Their defense was really well organized, they thoroughly outplayed Wales in the ruck, and when they got chances they took some of them. Their first try was a gift – John Barclay just shrugging off a 2-on-1 tackle from Cooper and Hook to break through for a score. But the second try was a perfectly executed grubber kick by Dan Parks that Max Evans was able to covert because, as Parks was well aware, Lee Byrne had been dragged out of position.

With six minutes to play, Wales were 10 points behind, and down and out. They had battered the Scottish line for much of the second half and come away with only one try – a beautifully worked move into the corner by Shane Williams and Lee Byrne that Stephen Jones failed to convert. However, two new factors were about to come into play. Firstly the Scots were exhausted from continual defense. The final stats show show that Scotland had made 136 tackles to Wales’s 73, and Wales completed 227 passes to Scotland’s 103. And secondly the referee was finally losing patience with Scotland slowing the game down. They had collapsed pretty much every scrum in the game, and were starting to resort to illegal play in the ruck as well.

The turning point in the game came when Scott Lawson was sin-binned for yet another infraction in a ruck. Wales stormed forward, taking advantage of the extra man, and Leigh Halfpenny ran in for a try. Crucially he had the presence of mind to run around behind the posts to give Jones the easiest of conversions.

From the kick off, Wales attacked again, and Lee Bryne broke through the Scottish defense. Phil Goodman panicked, and tripped him up. Wales were awarded a penalty, which Jones converted to bring the teams level. Goodman was, of course, sin-binned, leaving Scotland with only 13 men on the pitch.

Time ran out as the players were lining up for the re-start, but in rugby a game cannot end until the ball goes dead, so the referee insisted on one final play. Mike Blair could have hoofed the ball out of play to settle for a draw, or even kicked short to give his team a chance to recover the ball, but instead he kicked long and Wales poured forward again. A couple of minutes later Shane Williams (who else) cut through the Scottish line for the winning try.

It was, I have to say, a total steal. For 74 minutes Scotland absolutely deserved to win that game. But from the moment Lawson was sin-binned Wales ran in 17 unanswered points. As Wales found out last week, you can’t win if you leak points like that.

Elsewhere on a bitterly cold day in Paris Ireland looked to get some revenge for their soccer world cup defeat by the hand of Dieu Thierry Henry. Unfortunately the French comprehensively outplayed them for a 33-10 win. They look very good indeed. The tournament is now taking a week off to let players recover a bit, but in two weeks time France will come to Cardiff. Wales will have to raise their game significantly to avoid a thrashing. Richie Rees appears to have done enough to earn a start at scrum half ahead of the ineffective Cooper, but I’m very worried about Wales at the breakdown and the lineout. Thankfully the French lineout is their one weakness, but their back row forwards are probably the best in the tournament.