Six Nations half-term report: Ireland top of class but Wales go from bad to worse | Ugo Monye

Ireland

There was a suspicion of vulnerability to Ireland coming into the Six Nations but they have answered those questions in style so far. Perhaps we’d just become a bit complacent about their standards but, as the only side unbeaten after two rounds, they look formidable.

We can talk about injuries and how they have affected other teams but Ireland have had theirs as well and they lost their head coach with Andy Farrell on secondment with the British & Irish Lions. Simon Easterby hasn’t missed a trick so far which is testament to his coaching ability as well as to the structure in place at Ireland.

He has been helped by how settled things are in terms of personnel and how beneficial having such a dominant Leinster core is, but he backed Sam Prendergast after a

difficult outing against England

and was rewarded with a man of the match

showing against Scotland

.

They have such smart players and, to use the example of Jack Conan, players who can slot in seamlessly and even up the intensity from the bench. In the past two Six Nations, Ireland have lost Johnny Sexton and Farrell but they are the team to beat as they pursue an unprecedented third successive title.

Grade: A

France

After two rounds we’ve seen France at their best and worst. I thought inconsistency was a thing of the past with

Les Bleus

and they were my pre-championship favourites but, while they have deadly scorers in Antoine Dupont, Damian Penaud and Louis Bielle-Biarrey, at Twickenham they could not finish their Sunday lunch. They

gift-wrapped that match to England

.

I don’t want to pin the blame on Matthieu Jalibert but I do believe that, had Romain Ntamack not been suspended for a reckless tackle and been on the pitch against England, France would have prevailed. Ntamack brings that extra degree of control and he would have stayed on for 80 minutes, allowing Dupont to stay at scrum-half and exert influence from his best position. It wasn’t Jalibert’s fault that all those passes went to ground but Ntamack is a better game manager and that was what France needed at Twickenham.

The question now is can they shake it from their system, beat Italy and pull off the victory in Dublin. I believe they have it in them because of the size of their forward pack – Emmanuel Meafou has been one of the players of the championship to date – but they might just need to deny Ireland a bonus point and that is a tall order at the Aviva Stadium.

Grade: C+

England

I can only imagine the cocktail of emotions the players experienced after getting over the line against France. I know how it feels, it can be like the walls are closing in, the support is wavering, but the mood around England has changed so much after last weekend. Defeat and the pressure on Steve Borthwick and questions over his future would have reached a whole extra level but they can look forward to ending their disappointing Calcutta Cup streak without that heat on them.

It wasn’t perfect against France and individual errors let them down against Ireland but I saw fixes last weekend which give me reasons for optimism. They played the territory battle so much better against France, pinning them back in the second half just as Ireland had done to them seven days earlier. They looked better connected in attack with Ollie Lawrence playing a pivotal role and the impact of the replacements bench was so much more significant: Jamie George and Ollie Chessum came on and made a real difference but actually what impressed me was that Borthwick didn’t make changes for the sake of it.

Chandler Cunningham-South didn’t make it on to the pitch after a difficult time of things in Dublin. He’ll learn from it but the four back‑rowers who did play all made significant contributions. Alex Mitchell was in fine fettle at scrum‑half and he ended up playing 80 minutes – the first No 9 to do so for England since Ben Youngs in 2022. And they stayed in the fight, as demonstrated by Ollie Sleightholme chasing Bielle‑Biarrey, forcing that extra pass. That bodes well coming into the business end of the championship.

Grade: C-

Scotland

It is hard not to feel genuine disappointment about Scotland. They were

scratchy against Italy

and just didn’t turn up against Ireland. Then I look at Scotland’s Six Nations form over the past five years – they’ve had a win ratio of 52% and never finished higher than third. Perhaps they are just going along as they are meant to, roughly where you’d expect them to be. Why the sense of disappointment? Because you look at the team sheet and you expect better.

Granted they have been hit by injuries because Sione Tuipulotu is the best No 12 in the world at the moment and they have the second smallest player pool, behind only Italy. But they are so capable. They put Australia to the sword in the autumn, made 12 linebreaks against South Africa and they’ve had England’s number of late. They can dazzle, they have so many flair players but there comes a time when they have to be more than a team who can produce big moments.

They have it in them to come to Twickenham and get their championship back on track but Scotland need to develop into a side that is more than one with the occasion big win in them.

Grade: D-

Italy

What impressed me most about their

victory over Wales

was their tactical discipline. It was a wet and miserable day in Rome and their captain, Michele Lamaro, said afterwards that it forced them to play a way that they didn’t want to. But they stuck to the task, put boot to ball, won the aerial battle, chased hard and displayed excellent work-rate and physicality. Some teams can get bored of doing the same thing over and over again for 80 minutes but Italy didn’t. It was such a tactically astute performance and while Wales rallied in the final few minutes, the game was gone.

Paolo Garbisi controlled proceedings and in truth the margin of victory should have been greater. Credit must go to Gonzalo Quesada. He was a great game controller in his day and he’s managed to introduce some pragmatism to Italy without sacrificing their attacking threat.

They now have three difficult fixtures against France, England and Ireland to come but they have lost just once in their last five Six Nations matches and they are above where the ecosystem of the championship dictates where they should be.

Grade: C

Wales

It could not have gone any worse for Wales. Last year was the worst in their history and then they began the Six Nations by being

nilled for the first time in 27 years away to France

. They looked rudderless, players were out of position and the gameplan was blunt. Things reached a new ebb against Italy. They were tactically outthought and there was just no desperation from the players. Around half an hour in, Garbisi was lining up a drop-goal and only Jac Morgan and one other player showed any sort of desperation to close him down. In every metric, measured against all other tier one nations, Wales come bottom.

The change was inevitable after the Italy defeat and with

Matt Sherratt replacing Warren Gatland

for the next three matches I do expect a bit of bounce. Not enough to beat Ireland but Sherratt’s task is to get Wales competitive in these matches again. The changes he has made to the squad are positive – it beggared belief that Max Llewellyn, Gareth Ancscombe and Jarrod Evans were not in the initial group – and in a way I think it helps that Sherratt has said he only wants to be there in the short-term.

It allows him to focus on the short-term while the union sets about appointing a director of rugby and a head coach who can take Wales forward. Whoever they appoint, the key is that the two can work in harmony together. It’s like a back-row blend. There’s no point in having fantastic individuals who cannot dovetail together. Finding the right balance will be all important.

Grade: U