Six nations guide – who will be the team to beat?
he 2021 Guinness
Six Nations Championship will be a tournament like no other in its history. Titanic battles and ageold rivalries that would normally be settled in front of capacity crowds, will now be accompanied by eerie silences punctuated only by players’ verbal offerings and coaches shouting instructions.
Six Nations squads will be in their own protective bubbles, preparing in isolation away from the media pack familiar with thronging training bases from Dublin to Rome.
And all against a back-drop of hope that Covid-19 will not disrupt northern hemisphere rugby’s biggest event.
Rugby had a glimpse of its new environment during November and December when the Autumn Nations Cup took centre-stage.
England won it, as they did the 2020 Six Nations, which started in February and had a delayed conclusion in late October.
And it was perhaps not a coincidence that the best game – a gripping final between England and France – had the tournament’s only permitted crowd, albeit just 2,000 cheering on the teams at Twickenham.
English rugby headquarters will again be the venue for what could be the pivotal encounter of this season’s Six Nations.
England meet France on March 13, with bookmakers’ odds suggesting the title’s destiny effectively comes down to which team emerges victorious that early Saturday evening in south-west London.
It is difficult to envisage Eddie Jones’ England not putting together another full-scale assault on silverware.
Since the Australian was appointed in late 2015, England have won the Six Nations three times from five attempts, and they again look well-set.
If consistency counts for anything, then England appear a good furlong clear of the field, yet the Six Nations is rarely a one-horse race and a photo-finish cannot be discounted.
Current form guides suggest that France, enjoying a renaissance under head coach Fabien Galthie, could push England to the wire.
Galthie, whose coaching
Tlieutenants are headed by imperious defence specialist Shaun Edwards, has steered Les Bleus out of the doldrums, with talent like Antoine Dupont and Romain Ntamack headlining the revival.
France beat England in their opening Six Nations game last year and took them to extra-time before seeing Nations Cup final hopes dashed just under eight weeks ago.
Everything points to an Anglo-French title tussle, although Ireland could have something to say about that, given the playing personnel at head coach Andy Farrell’s disposal.
And captain Johnny Sexton said: “Every team is
sat in their different training centres setting targets to win the Six Nations, you’re not coming in here going, ‘I hope we finish third or second’.
“We’re here to try and win, that’s the name of the game in professional sport.
“How do we do that? We do that by performing well and by trying to get better from our last outing.
“We felt we built through the Autumn Nations Cup after a disappointing end to the Six Nations and we want to go up a level, we want
to go up a couple of levels because we want to be able to challenge the best teams in Europe for the foreseeable future.
“We want to be up there with the best and that’s France and England at the moment.
“But you look at the Six Nations table and anyone can go out and win it, I think.”
Scotland continue to progress under Gregor Townsend’s direction, but Wales and their new head coach Wayne Pivac have got it all to do following a dismal 12-month period when they won just three Tests from 10 starts.
The wooden spoon again beckons for Italy, whose opening two games are against France and England, and it will be fascinating to see what odds might be offered on a repeat of last year’s Six Nations finishing positions – England, France, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Italy.