SIX NATIONS: Wales roar back, Scottish win in Rome and England beat Irish in Classic

WALES  27 - 6 FRANCE

Wales enjoyed home comforts in the third round of matches in the Six Nations championship. The Welsh was expected to come up against an in-form France side at the Millenium Stadium, instead it was the Red shirts of Wales that proved to be red hot in this encounter. Warren Gatland had wanted to get a response from his reigning champions, after they had been mauled in more ways than one in their previous outing against the current leaders in Ireland  when they played a fortnight ago in Dublin.

 France`s Nicolas Mas runs on for the French  PIC: ESPN RUGBY 

It was an unbelievable opening twenty minutes of play for the home side in which seen Wales lead 14-3 as France didn`t know what had hit them at all.  Leigh Halfpenny gave the Welsh the lead after just Three minutes of play, when the French conceded at the ruck to see them ahead in the game at 3-0.  That lead then got increased after some hesitation in the French ranks noticeably, by Full-back Brice Dulin as he tried to let the ball bounce first and in doing so let in George North behind him, who nipped in ahead of him to grab the ball and go over the try line for a early 8-0 score line.

Pascal Pape was then penalised for kicking the ball out of the scrum and in which, gave Halfpenny a chance to redeem himself for missing an earlier conversion. However this time round he made no mistake at all and his kick sailed through for an 11-0 score after just 9 minutes of play. Jean-Marc Doussain then kicked over a penalty for France to see the visitors get on the scoreboard that was before Leigh Halfpenny then converted another penalty this time from 40 metres out, to make it 14-3.

Jules Plisson took over kicking duties for Les Bleus and his first effort went over the bar to see them cut the gap down to just 8 points.  Wales won yet another penalty as the French was lacking a lot of discipline throughout their side and saw Wesley Fofana get stuck between the proverbial  ‘rock and a hard place’ as he chose to just lay on the ball, which in part gave the hosts a chance to go further ahead thanks to the boot of Halfpenny for a 17-6 lead.  France conceded yet another penalty, courtesy of their own scrum this time round and seen Wales have a commanding 20-6 lead.

  Warburton stretches out for Wales TRY:  PIC: ESPN RUGBY

 Second half saw both Gethin Jenkins and Nicolas Mas head to the sin bin for consistence offences at the scrum and so saw both sides down to 14 men in the 50^th minute. France found themselves down to 13 men on the pitch, when France Captain Louis Picamoles was shown the yellow card after he lost his head and was clearly frustrated, as he shoved a couple of Welsh players as well as grabbing them round the throats too. Allan Rolland then shown the Captain yellow and he responded with a sarcastic applause towards the match official.

Wales pushed for more points with the man advantage and saw them score another try, through the efforts of Captain Sam Warburton who managed to get some downward pressure on the ball with his fingertips making contact to see the home side lead 27-6 with Halfpenny adding extras. The win for Wales saw them move into Second place going level on points with Ireland who would face England the next day.  

 ITALY  20 – 21  SCOTLAND

  Luke McClean of Italy gets caught in possession PIC: ESPN RUGBY

Scotland`s Duncan Weir drop goal helped the Scots pick up a massive win in Rome to beat Italy and did it with plenty of grit, determination and hard work throughout the side. It also seen the Scots record their first away victory in the competition with their last win coming back in 2010.   

Italy took the lead in the 13^th minute of play, after a penalty against the visitors gave the former U18 player for Scotland in Tomasso Allen the chance to put the country of his birth ahead and saw his kick go over to see the Olimipico Stadium go mad with celebrations as they led 3-0. Scotland responded 9 minutes later, when good work by the visitors saw them go through the phases and their terrific build up play saw Scotland awarded a penalty. Greig Laidlaw then managed to do something he was unable to do in the last game and that was see his a kick successfully go through the posts to see Scott Johnson men go level.

The Scots was getting penalised at alarmingly regular rate by referee Steve Walsh as he made some baffling calls against the away team, but that also seen Allan have the chance to put Italy back ahead in the contest and he did just that, as the home side retook the lead again with his successful penalty kick.  Italy then pressured the Scottish defence and after some good work by Sergio Parisse that saw him get dangerously close to the Scottish try line, Tomasso Allan then collected and went over the line to see Italy lead 13-3 at half time with the former Scottish player scoring all of the Italian`s points.

  

Alex Dunbar goes over Scotland   PIC: ESPN RUGBY  

Five minutes into the second half of play, Greig Laidlaw then kicked over a penalty for Scotland to seem them hunt down the Italians after they conceded a penalty at the breakdown and seem the score line become 13-6 to the hosts. Scotland then grabbed a well worked try when play was spread wide by the forwards and seen Stuart Hogg pass to Alex Dundar, who then dashed for the corner to see them trail by just a margin of two points at 13-11.  That try gave the visitors the belief that they could go on and win this game now and Italy was visibly rocked at this point in time.

That belief grew around the entire team after that try for the visitors, when Scotland took the lead for the first time in the game.  Scotland built up from the back and with some lovely all round play in the passing department and with nice some off loads, it saw Alex Dunbar make another run for the try line and in doing so he managed to out run the Italian defence and see them lead 18-13.  With 10 minutes to go in the match, Italy scored a try through Josh Furno which saw the Scottish back line found wanting, after Sergio Parisse had set up Furno to go over and with Luciano Orquera kicking the extras to go 20-18 up.

With less than a minute of play to go in this game, Scotland saw their maul drive the Italians back to the Hosts 22 metre line and Scotland keeping their eyes on the time left and field placements, the ball came back to Duncan Weir and his Drop goal attempt went high and through the uprights to see Scotland pick up victory and see them win the match in dramatic fashion 21-20.

ENGLAND 13-10 IRELAND

Ireland`s winning run in the Six Nations tournament this year came to an end at the hands of England, as their first match away from the Aviva Stadium in the tournament seen them lose an absolute classic at Twickenham. England managed to just edge this pulsating and breathtaking contest, to see them move level on points with Ireland and make the title a four-horse race as things hot up to see who takes the crown this year.

The game got off to a frenetic start that saw Ireland put pressure on the English scrum early on and saw them over power the home side at the scrum. This was Ireland drawing first blood in the game, as England knew now what they were dealing with for the next Eighty minutes of this contest game.  England then came straight back at Ireland and thought they had scored an early try after Jonny May went over the line for the home side, but saw Conor Murray manage to stop May from scoring. South African official Craig Joubert sent the decision upstairs for the TMO to look at it and confirm the decision. Replays shown May had lost the ball when attempting to ground the ball and in doing so lost the ball and so the decision was a NO TRY was given.

Rob Kearney scores a Try for Ireland PIC: ESPN RUGBY

We then saw in the 25^th minute Owen Farrell kick over the games first points as a 50 metre penalty kick sail over for the home side to make it 3-0 after Ireland committed a foul in the line out. Farrell then had another kick to increase the last ten minutes of the first half, but the ball struck the outside of the post and the score remained the same.

In the opening few minutes of the second half, Ireland stormed their way into the lead after Rob Kearney ran into a gap and under the posts for a well worked Ireland try and ended, in a 7-3 lead for the away side after Johnny Sexton kicked the conversion over. Things got even better for the Irish soon after, when Sexton successfully kicked over a penalty for the Green shirts to take a 10-3 lead and the Irish fans and players were certainly smiling. England then burst into life in the 51^st  minutes for a couple of minutes, when they suddenly took the lead. Luther Burrell went close to the line for the English until the Irish defence held firm and saw them stop the white shirts from grabbing a try.

  Danny Care celebrates as he goes over for England PIC: ESPN RUGBY

England won a penalty as a result of their hard play and although they should have switched the play to the outside, Farrell kicked over from close range to make it 10-6 in Irelands favour, but England were gaining momentum . Then in the 55^th minute, Mike Brown managed to cut through the Irish defence like a knife and kept his head to offload to Danny Care who ran the ball home to see England make it 13-10 and turn the game on it`s head. England now had the momentum with them and with Ireland pushing the home side all the way to the final whistle. Stuart Lancaster`s men gave as good as they got, to show the powerful Ireland side that this young England side was no push over of the hosts. Stuart Lancaster at the full time whistle shown his delight at winning a hard contested match with both sides committed in the game.

England congratulate themselves on a hard earned win PIC: ESPN RUGBY

This now sees Wales, Ireland, France and England all in with a chance to take the crown home and makes for an exciting final two games in the competition.

RBS 6 Nations Championship

	Team	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	For	Against	Points
1	Ireland	3	2	0	1	64	22	4
2	England	3	2	0	1	57	36	4
3	Wales	3	2	0	1	53	47	4
4	France	3	2	0	1	62	61	4
5	Scotland	3	1	0	2	27	68	2
6	Italy	3	0	0	3	45	74	0