I don’t get this six nations (pre/post rwc) are meaningless stuff! Meaningless to who? Definately not to 99.9% of the fans, definately not to the players or the coaches, so meaningless only to some sad individuals with some arbitrary yardstick on when a rugby game becomes legitimate?

I’m not so sure. EJ’s retained 5 centres in the Squad, including Burrell (I retract my earlier comment about him playing badly).

We know Ford is a defensive weakness, so surely EJ does too and we need to counter DD. Farrell has to be on the pitch for kicking duties. So could it be Farrell, Burrell & JJ to start with Tuliagi for impact in the last 20 – the latter is indicative of the current EJ game strategy.

Not a combo I think Wales will enjoy defending against… Tuliagi or Farrell is much more up their street…. but if Farrell was directing things it would make me a little happier, although he obviously brings the penalty points to the table. It’s a Twickers anyway so the question is not who will win, but “England by how many” 😉 Conservative win or total humiliation? 😳

Scamps – but they went into the ice room * in the spa to talk tactic instead

* ice wall and crushed ice to smother yourself in. Feels great.

I don’t see Daly or Manu starting, so that’s Roberts running at 10/12 all afternoon…. If Roberts flattens Farrell, he takes out our best kicker too.

*worries*

When it’s not illegally high and late, it’s just high. Not an ideal technique against the Doctor.

Don’t worry, he’ll growl a lot and pull some faces too which always helps

…and the good Dr has a penchant for going on the high side of legal too!

He wrote a good piece in the Torygraph today though.

Not to be argumentative, but my opinion is that you are. We made a mess of Samson Lee last time, same again here.

Your back 3 are better on the floor though, we are penalty magnets, and the rumor is Itoje is benched for Launchbury which I think is a mistake. Itoje should be in for his floor work and speed, Launchbury 2nd half/ 20 mins if we have a lead and his bulk helps with some smashing Walkers backwards.

I see Biggar’s been making a nuisance of himself in the papers, lets see how long he lasts on the pitch – he’ll be a target for sure.

Still a close call whatever our respective opinions are.

CFH – on your graphic, the Welsh number 1 is doing an almost identical angle, as is the flanker.

I thought that earlier. The sensible thing would be to start with Mako, win the scrums and get it into Jouberts head that the Welsh are the problem, then sub to Marler later.

Assumptionist is assumptioning.

Certainly now. I seem to remember a thing welsh fans liked to do; how many of the english team would make the welsh side. Well if we did the same for the front rows now, none of the welsh players would make the england bench.

Those videos prove two things.

1: All of the strums were a mess
2: It was all about Mr S Walsh.

@CFH and the Welsh 7 (Warburton?) ? You could draw all sorts of arrows on that photo

@Drac we can agree to differ on 6N vs Investec, far more important how we do against Aus, RSA, NZ than say Scotland or Italy. I’ve paid to watch Eng v Italy twice in 20 years (some of that before 6N of course), never saw the point.

To be fair that photo, and in particular the arrow is complete bollocks.