Well, that was a good day at the office. It is, of course, a bit of a stretch to describe the Cardiff Blues as a “Welsh” side, stuffed as they are with star New Zealanders, but that’s the reality of modern club rugby, and the Blues to contain a several stars of the Welsh XV as well: Martyn Williams, Tom Shanklin, Leigh Halfpenny, Jamie Roberts, Andy Powell, Gethin Jenkins. The short version is, “we stuffed them, 50-12”. There is no longer version because I only had audio and had to leave half way through the second half before it started raining tries. Besides, after a statement like that, who needs a long version?

Next stop, Heineken Cup.

The other two Heineken Cup semi-finals were played today. I am sorry to say that the Ospreys were totally out-matched. The 43-9 scoreline was entirely fair, and actually the 9 points the Ospreys scored all came from Munster mistakes.

Thankfully the Harlequins-Leinster game was an absolutely nail-biter right to the end. It ended 6-5 in favor of the Irish, and there were a whole pile of “might have been” situations. The Leinster try came from a single bit of O’Driscoll brilliance and a lucky bounce of that odd-shaped ball. Leinster will point to the ref blowing up for a penalty when Fitzgerald looked to have a clear advantage. Quins will rue their luck in losing three (yes three) fly halves to injury during the game. Any minor twitch of fate could have tipped the result the other way.

So Leinster will play Munster in the other semi-final, and as it is scheduled for Croke Park that’s a home game for them. I still fancy Munster though, they were awesome.

It is a great weekend for rugby, with the quarter-finals of the Heineken Cup being played. And also, of course, a fabulous come-from-behind win in Perth by the Hurricanes who scored two tries in the last 10 minutes to steal a win. Go ‘Canes!

Meanwhile, back in Europe, Cardiff and Toulouse staged a rematch of the first ever Heineken Cup Final at the Millennium Stadium. Toulose won that game, and went on to win the trophy two more times, but this year are the only French side left at the knock-out of the competition. The game was a tense affair, which Cardiff eventually won 9-6. Not the prettiest rugby in the world, despite the presence of the famed Toulouse back line. Credit then to Cardiff for keeping such dangerous players quiet.

Next up was an equally tense and somewhat more exciting clash between Leicester and Bath. The game was tied 15-15 going into the last 10 minutes, and both sides had opportunities to scores. As it turned out, a brilliant break by Leicester’s French replacement scum half, Julien Dupuy, finally separated the two sides and won the game for the Tigers. Leicester now play Cardiff in the semi-finals.

Tomorrow the Ospreys travel to defending champions, Munster, with Lee Byrne and Gavin Henson both unavailable through injury. In addition BOD* leads the Leinster war band to The Stoop to take on Harlequins. I shall watch both games, and in the latter hope to spot Will in the crowd. He has promised me photos.

* That’s Brian O’Driscoll, to the uninitiated.

Well, there’s no getting around this, we were beaten by the better side on the day. Wales very nearly won the game. They lost by a few feet, which is the distance by which Stephen Jones’s last minute penalty kick failed to get over the crossbar. The game was that close.

However, Ireland scored two good tries, while Wales never looked like scoring. They also wrecked the Welsh lineout. It was really only their own indiscipline that allowed the score to be so close.

As everyone else is pointing out, the last time Ireland won a Grand Slam was 61 years ago. Wales achieved that feat most recently in 2005 and 2008, so it would be churlish to deny Mr. O’Driscoll and his colleagues their moment of glory.

Next year, on the other hand…

Before that, however, there is the small matter of the Lions tour of South Africa.

Well, that was not the desired result. Yes, we won, but it would have been good to win by a much wider margin, and in a much more convincing manner.

As I recall, Wales got into a good try scoring position three times in the match. Two of those they converted, fairly easily. The third might have ended in a try with a less observant referee (not that there was any deliberate foul play, just a question as to whether a ball went forward out of a tackle). Italy, in contrast, spent much of the match camped in the Wales half, but never once looked like scoring a try.

So why didn’t we win by a bigger margin? I think mainly because we were not taking the game to the Italians. Way too much possession was wasted by aimless kicking and silly penalties. The Italians, in contrast, were much more disciplined than usual. They didn’t give away penalties, they didn’t drop many high balls, and they kicked well from hand. They also did well at the breakdown and in the scrums, and kicked what penalty opportunities came their way.

Meanwhile Ireland won in Edinburgh, and continue to look favorites. But they do have to go to Cardiff next weekend, so the championship could well come down to points difference. It will be good to beat them anyway, because there is the matter of the Triple Crown at stake (a trophy for beating all three other “home” British/Irish countries). But to win the championship we have to end up with a bigger overall points difference than the Irish. They are currently on +46, and we are on +21. Fortunately, because we are playing each other, each +1 for us is also a -1 for them, so we need to win in Cardiff by a clear 13 points. That’s doable, but difficult.

Don’t rule out the French either. If they win at Twickenham tomorrow they will be well placed to challenge for the championship. Their points difference is only +5, but they can add to that tomorrow and have a final game against Italy. It should be a very interesting last weekend.

One of the things about Sevens rugby is that because the games are so short you can get lots of them in during a day. However, I wasn’t expecting the final to be played today. I was wrong. Here are the results.

Semi finals: Wales 19 – 12 Samoa; Argentina 12 – 0 Kenya.

Final: Wales 19 – 12 Argentina.

You can find a report on the game, and pictures of happy Welsh players celebrating, on the official web site.

Update: Congratulations to the Aussie girls who beat New Zealand in extra time in the women’s final. And commiserations to the USA who lost narrowly to the Kiwis in the semi-finals.

OK, so it was only Sevens, but it was the Sevens World Cup, and how often do we beat the All Blacks anyway?

For the benefit of non-rugby folks, Sevens is a 7-a-side variant of the game played on a full-size pitch which values speed and quick thinking over strength. Rather like Twenty20 cricket, it is a fast and furious game that gives less talented sides a much better chance of an upset. The quarter-finals have been played today (the matches don’t last that long because the action is non-stop and exhausting) and all four games have provided surprises. In addition to the Welsh win, Samoa beat England, Argentina beat South Africa, both in really close games, and the reigning World Champions, Fiji, were destroyed 26-7 by Kenya.

Lots of other games are going on, including a women’s tournament. Official web site here.

Scotland and Italy managed to make each other look good this afternoon. By being more on the same level, they produced a competitive game that was most notable for the fact that the Scottish backline actually scored a try (and almost scored a couple more) for the first time in what seems like several millennia. (Yes, I know they have scored some recently, but they haven’t looked like they could, save for the odd bit of Evans brilliance.) The fate of the wooden spoon now appears to have been settled. The 26-6 win by Scotland will probably be their only win of the winter, and Italy still have to play Wales and France.

The Ireland – England match was no better. Having been installed as favorites for the championship thanks to the Welsh loss last night, Ireland developed an extreme case of deer-in-the-headlights syndrome. O’Gara in particular had a dreadful game, leading me to wonder whether he was down with flu or something.

Fortunately for the Irish, Brian O’Driscoll was not going to allow them to lose, despite various attempts by English players to send him to hospital. Furthermore, the English team appeared to be determined to throw the game away. I worry about poor Martin Johnson’s blood pressure. As it turned out, England actually woke up in the last 10 minutes and the final score was 14-13. If they had played like that the whole match they would have won. As it is, that narrow result will suit Wales and France very well as the championship may be decided on points difference.

Well, these things would not be winning if they were not hard to get. And boy was that a hard-fought game.

I have no complaints. The French side were magnificent throughout. They coped well with playing part of the match with a make-shift fly half, and all of the match with a make-shift goal kicker. Their energy and commitment were faultless. Wales also played very well, and in the last 10 minutes of the match I counted four line-outs inside the French red zone. Any one of those could have resulted in a match-winning try. As it was, we lost by 5 points, and the Grand Slam dream is over for another year.

The championship, on the other hand, is still wide open. Every team except Ireland has now lost a game, but they still have to play England and Wales, each of which have lost only once. England still have to play France. There is still everything to play for, and if the rest of the championship produces games that are as bruising as this one we’ll be in for a lot of entertainment.

It took Ireland a while to get going in Rome, but eventually they ran out easy winners 38-9. Despite the scoreline, Italy actually looked a lot better this week. Having an experienced scrum half, in the eccentrically side-burned Paul Griffen, made a world of difference. In two weeks time we have France-Wales, Ireland-England and Scotland-Italy. I think those might actually be three very close games.

Today was something of a repeat of last Saturday – one joke game and one excellent one.

Scotland were a little better today than they were against Wales, thanks in no small part to the selection of the Evans brothers, but their pack is still getting beaten up a lot. Going in a game with only one specialist second row in your squad can’t be good. France, on the other hand, were largely incapable of capitalizing on their up front dominance, and the one try that they scored could have been ruled out for any number of reasons. Their 22-13 win was deserved, but only just.

England made a significant improvement on last week, and when they can get the ball to the likes of Flutie and Sackey they look a really good team. They were also superb in defense, snuffing out Welsh attacks in the red zone on a number of occasions. Joe Worsley really earned his man of the match award. And of course they scored two tries to the Welsh one.

And yet they lost, 23-15. They lost in part because the Welsh side is confident and disciplined; they lost in part because they were indisciplined; and they lost in part because they telegraphed their game plan. Some England fans will doubtless be complaining that Jonathan Kaplan favored the Welsh. I have no sympathy, and I think this should be a lesson for Martin Johnson. If you go into a game saying that you intend to bully the other team off the park, and prevent them from attacking by slowing the ball down, then the referee will be primed to look for infringements at the ruck, and will have his hand on the yellow card before the game has even started.

Next weekend there are no games, which will give you folks a bit of a break from my rugby fanaticism, and Shane Williams a chance to get his ankle right before the big game in Paris. I don’t expect the French to be as bad again. Here’s looking forward to a good game.

For 60 minutes at Murrayfield Wales were totally dominant and playing some of the best rugby I have seen from them in ages. The fact that the scoreline was only 13-26 is due partly to some woeful place kicking from the Welsh, and partly due to wholesale substitutions on 60 minutes that caused the team to take their eye off the ball rather, and let the Scots back into the game. It could easily have been a massacre. More analysis follows..
Continue reading →

Well, that was an interesting start to the tournament. It began with one of the worst games of international rugby I have ever seen, and was followed by an exciting, high quality encounter between two very good sides.

The short version, for those allergic to sports is as follows: England beat Italy 36-11; Ireland beat France 30-21. More detail follows.
Continue reading →

Yes, it is that time of year again. And that means that those of you who are allergic to sports are going to have to put up with me wittering on about Wales for a few weeks. Sorry about that, but this is a personal blog. So as not to pollute too much of your screen real estate I’ll try to put the longer posts behind cuts. Here’s a preview of the first round of matches that take place today and tomorrow.
Continue reading →

After a fine weekend of rugby (albeit a wet and muddy one in many places) we finally have a quarter-final line-up for the Heineken Cup. Here it is:

• Cardiff v Toulouse
• Munster v Ospreys
• Harlequins v Leinster
• Leicester v Bath

That’s a juicy set of matches: Wales v France, Ireland v Wales, England v Ireland and one all-English clash. The Leicester-Bath game looks the most enticing, as you’d expect as the games are seeded and that’s the 4 v 5 match. Those matches, however, won’t be played until April. First there is the small matter of the Six Nations Championship to be decided.

Will: if the camera is still in good form I’d like some pin-up pictures of Mr. O’Driscoll if you please.