Wales' win over Scotland was full of exciting attacking rugby. Photo / Getty
Wales' win over Scotland was full of exciting attacking rugby. Photo / Getty
OPINION:
Phil Gifford presents six talking points from this weekend's two big games in the Six Nations.
Maybe unicorns are real
The scoresheet from Wales' 20-17 victory over Ireland in Cardiff, with only two tries, one of them from a close-range forward drive after a lineout, would indicate that allis as normal in northern rugby, with teams attempting to win by battering and boring the opposition into submission.
As someone who has been cynical for decades about the way the game is played in Great Britain, I swear that the reality in Cardiff was totally different. So let's hear it for Welsh coach Wayne Pivac and his Scottish counterpart, Gregor Townsend, who sent out two teams who, on a wet, grey afternoon, ran the ball with intent and high levels of skill.
With the exception of the 10 minutes after halftime there was almost no aimless kicking, or as in the brilliant phrase of BBC commentator Eddie Butler, "foot tennis". The ball was advanced almost entirely by hand, and with the score close from start to finish, it was one of the great test matches.
The sensational Swansea scaffolder
Welsh fullback Liam Williams, rather like another brilliant backfielder, All Black Ben Smith, wasn't swooped on as a schoolboy star, and after working as a scaffolder, wasn't signed by a Welsh club until he was 20.
Williams is now 30, but in his 74th test for Wales, he played with the daring and fearlessness of a teenager. He's not big by international standards at 85kg but he's tough and still prepared, in the cauldron of a test, to do the unexpected.
Fifty-two minutes into the game against Scotland, with Wales down 17-14, he took a kick under pressure inside his own 22. Just as a Scottish tackler was about to engulf him he flicked a one-handed reverse pass to first-five Dan Biggar, who cleared the ball. It was a stroke of breath-taking genius.
Scotland's firecracker wing, Darcy Graham, who scored his team's only try, looks like he's stepped straight from an illustrated Enid Blyton Famous Five book. From the tousled blond hair to the wee gap in his front teeth when he smiles, you wonder if he arrived at the ground fresh from a lovely bike ride with his chums.
But once the whistle blows he's a tough, fierce battler, with pace to burn and a tactical awareness that has no doubt developed from first playing senior rugby as a 17-year-old seven years ago. His rugby smarts made his try, when he sprinted to take an inside pass from his gifted first-five Finn Russell, look easy.
Which tartan do these guys wear?
Scotland, like every British and Irish team now, benefit from imports, and in case you wondered, no, there isn't a Clan Tuipulotu in Scotland that second-five Sione springs from (he was born in Sydney). Nor a Clan van der Merwe (wing Duhan was born in George, in South Africa). No Clan Schoeman either (prop Pierre comes from Mbombela, also in South Africa). Schoeman and van der Merwe qualify from residency in Scotland, and Tuipulotu has a Scottish grandmother.
Antoine Dupont dives over to score the first try of the match against Ireland. Photo / Getty
Angus the Brave
In contrast to the test in Cardiff, the game in Paris - where France beat Ireland 30-24 - was largely dour and error ridden, with the exception of two great solo tries for Ireland and one early flash of Gallic brilliance for a try by Antoine Dupont.
My man of the match was Aussie referee Angus Gardner, who, despite a ferocious reaction from the sell-out crowd of 80,000 at Parc des Princes, did the right thing from the time he judged that Irish centre Bundee Aki hadn't shoulder charged French captain Dupont to the bitter end, when he disallowed a try to fullback Melvyn Jaminet.
I love French rugby fans, but from the first time I saw a game at the Parc des Princes in 1977, I realised that some of them are crazy. On that autumn day 45 years ago they were letting fireworks off at the back of the stand as a young All Blacks team tipped over France, 15-3.
In these troubled times no incendiary devices would get past security, but I'm picking Gardner wouldn't have needed a translator to pick up what the passionate, jet-engine-level loud French supporters were howling at him. Good on him for staying calm and accurate throughout.
I'm with Aaron
In February last year this is how Aaron Smith responded to a tweet from Six Nations Rugby asking, "Who is the best rugby player in the world right now?" Smith picked Dupont. "This guy is on another level! No one is near him atm (at the moment). He's the point of difference for both his club and country. He's helping me look at parts of my game to improve."
Dupont really is a remarkable player, whose bullet passes almost invariably give a half-a-step start to his backline. Is he actually better than Smith? Last year you'd have had to say yes. But if the All Blacks this year can find the sort of mojo France had in 2021, I'd pick Smith to edge ahead in the battle of two quick passing and running, daring, tough halfbacks. To be fair, if I'd ever taken sky rockets to a test match I might think differently.
