A bonus pod to set us up nicely for the remaining two rounds of the Six Nations featuring an all-provincial panel.
🏉 The 2023 6N so far
🏉 Ireland’s “work-ons”
🏉 Expectations for Rds 4&5
OUR SIX NATIONS PODCASTS ARE BROUGHT TO YOU BY FANZO, DOWNLOAD THE FREE FANZO APP AND JOIN OUR PREDICTION LEAGUE, CODE = HARPIN TO BE IN WITH A CHANCE OF WINNING A SIGNED COPY OF BRIAN’S BOOK.
With both Leinster & Ireland playing in the Scottish capital the next two weekends, our perfect guest to offer an opposition view was Sandy “@theburghwatch” Smith.
Imelda Reidy Great Italian performance. Job done. 5 points. On we roll.
Andrew Byrne Today showed one thing in particular, that Gary Ringrose is a world class operator and is streets ahead of the rest of them at playing outside centre. 12 and 13 are two very different positions, as shown by our defensive lapses today.
Alan Murphy Brilliant. Two teams playing the game in a positive way. Italy have really improved. Let’s be honest, some of our team today were 2-3rd choice and a few played out of position. We scored a bonus point, left some tries out there and also managed to think our way out of danger today. Previously we would have lost this game. Building strength in depth. So positive from me.
TWITTER
Ireland struggled against a good Italian team Farrell must be loving the chaos, but won't be happy with the amount of overplaying at times and how disconnected we were in defence
Winning with workons it's a lovely feeling#ITAvIRE
That is an utter disgrace, there are kids watching this game, these players have to be role models, there is simply no place in rugby for that sort of moustache #ITAvIREhttps://t.co/1VAMWvpli3
Joanne In fairness to Kieran Crowley, not only has he got Italy playing brilliantly, he’s got them believing too. So good to see and long may it continue.
Koochulainn Another win with a bonus point without conceding a losing bonus.
The performance wasn’t perfect, and Italy found some flaws in the defensive system, but you can’t get any more than five points.
Italy were great value for money too. After today and the 20s last night Italian rugby is heading in a good direction.
POTM Mack Hansen dropping an F bomb in the post match interview was a lovely coda
Colm Splendid match. Continued resurgence and improvement from Italy, and as usual this year, Ireland responded magnificently to pressure. Really looking forward to Murrayfield next month.
Given the travails experienced by the Murray family this past week, Conor showed immense fortitude and strength of character to even tog out today. Delighted for him and the whole squad! A fantastic performance.
Imelda Reidy
Some game. Outstanding from Ireland. There can be no argument now about the No. 1 team in the world. Need to drive on now and continue to improve. ☘☘
Gavin Hegarty
My god.what a game. We just got a bp over the second best team in the world.
Let’s not mention the definite red card.
Every man in green (bar Hanson in my view) was utterly outstanding.
Tom O’Toole, my god where did that come from? Was worried about bealham before the Wales games now we have three class tightheads.
Chuck Doris, world’s best 8. Completely outplayed alldrit.
Lowe’s try, Mon dieu c’est magnifique.
Take a bow Ireland, you have wrecked me.
TWITTER
This is a statement win for this Irish side. France are a top side and we've given them nothing.
Ireland 32 France 19 An absolute joy of a game to watch A 1st half filled with class chaos physicality some beautiful tries Then a 2nd half where both teams tightened up, some great tactical kicking That was one of the great rugby matches #IREvFRA#GuinnessSixNations
Koochulainn @Koochulainn So that’s the “bogey match” and the “defacto title decider” out of the way Bring on the “gimme” (which isnt what it used to be), the “potential banana skin”, and the “Auld enemy”.
Séamus Mac an tSábhaisigh @jamessavage French rugby fans affronted by selective tv replays … #karma winning big games well but with clear room for improvement each time is a very exciting place to be.
Some great individual performances, a few players who might feel they can improve on individual aspects, particularly Porter for me, who was responsible for almost half our penalties, can’t be that sloppy against the French. (though I’m discounting the one conceded as they scored a try)
Expectation will be high going onto next week, and rightly so, I want to see the same high intensity against France
Ian Frizzell
Out of the traps so quickly. We were so powerful in the first 30 minutes they didn’t have any answers.
Thought we coped pretty well in the third quarter when they threw everything they had at us and then a few fresh legs gave us the momentum to finish pretty strongly.
Gavin Hegarty
Job done. Rough second half but we shouldered it well.
Can’t help but think the ref played a part in their comeback but cest la vie.
I still can’t see the logic in bringing gatland back.
TWITTER
Why are the BBC focusing solely on Ireland’s second half? They were 24 points up and absolutely cruising. Wales were always going to throw everything at it. This happens in every team sport, you do as much as you have to do to win. Not many teams win easily in Cardiff. #WALvIRE
Andrew ByrneThat first half was ruthless, we were too comfortable in the 2nd half. That won’t be good enough next week, but you can only play one match at a time.For Wales they can fix a lot very quickly and will take scalps later in the tournament.
Brian Nisbet 10-34, with the Welsh playing much better in the second half. But that’s a clear statement of intent from Ireland with a BP win in the first match. Good stuff!
Rob Atkinson A much better performance from Wales, but need to be a lot better in the opposition 22, they need to be better. I’m sure it will come together later in the tournament
Ireland: 15. Hugo Keenan 14. Mack Hansen 13. Garry Ringrose 12. Stuart McCloskey 11. James Lowe 10. Johnny Sexton (c) 9. Jamison Gibson Park Conor Murray
1. Andrew Porter 2. Dan Sheehan 3. Finlay Bealham 4. Tadhg Beirne 5. James Ryan 6. Peter O’Mahony 7. Josh van der Flier 8. Caelan Doris
16. Rob Herring 17. Cian Healy Dave Kilcoyne 18. Tom O’Toole 19. Iain Henderson 20. Jack Conan 21. Conor Murray Craig Casey 22. Ross Byrne 23. Bundee Aki
Wales: 15. Liam Williams 14. Josh Adams 13. George North 12. Joe Hawkins 11. Rio Dyer 10. Dan Biggar 9. Tomos Williams
1. Gareth Thomas 2. Ken Owens > captain 3. Tomas Francis 4. Adam Beard 5. Alun Wyn Jones 6. Jac Morgan 7. Justin Tipuric 8. Taulupe Faletau
16. Scott Baldwin 17. Rhys Carre 18. Dillon Lewis 19. Dafydd Jenkins 20. Tommy Reffell 21. Rhys Webb 22. Owen Williams 23. Alex Cuthbert
Welcome to my 80+ column, a weekly post featuring final thoughts from the week of rugby just gone.
SIX NATIONS COMPETITION
The countdown to “6Mas” gets closer to zero and this year we’re launching a prediction league in conjunction with the Fanzo app, if we get good engagement we’ll offer some prizes for the best players so you’ll really help us out by joining and/or sharing the above graphic with your rugby loving pals.
Here at Harpin Manor we’re running a separate league among our squad of Six Nations podsters, namely myself, Keego, Mark Jackson, Tom Coleman, Conor Cronin, Rich Mifsud & RugbyKino. And don’t tell them I said this but none of them think any of you have a hope of beating them when it comes to forecasting so I guess you’ll just have to prove ‘em wrong won’t you 😜
WRAP OF A WRAP
Unfortunately Rich Mifsud had to sit our our wrap pod at the weekend due to illness and we hope we returns to fitness in time for next Sunday. Thankfully RugbyKino was able to answer the call and along with Conor we got an excellent summary of what was expected to be a much closer contest at the RDS.
If you missed it, check it out here or on most major platforms.
HARPIN’ ON…LEINSTER’S TAP N GO TRIES
For the pod I try to even out the portions of the match I get my guests to cover as best as I can, yet sadly I didn’t realise Kino had done a lot of preparation on Leinster’s success rate with short tap n go penalty options when I allocated our two tries against Cardiff to Conor. But when we finished recording the main pod Kino still shared the information and unbeknownst to him the mic was still “hot” so I got it all and made it into a bonus clip for YouTube which you see below.
If you’re playing the clip above maybe pop over and subscribe to the channel too? That’s where we post our Preview Show as well as other content throughout the week.
HARRY BYRNE TIK TOK
This week the TikTok spotlight turned to Harry Byrne, this was an important start for him and we thought he did realy well.
I’m doing my best to keep myself from donning the tinfoil hat but it would appear that unions from all Six Nations are experiencing varying forms of governance issues in the weeks leading up to the game’s greatest championship kicking off, almost as if (a) we’d have difficulty focusing on everything at once and (b) once the rugby starts we’re expected to forget it anyway.
None of it is pretty, and yes I do mean all unions are involved.
Recently we had the terrible allegations of systemic misogyny made against the WRU in a documentary, which of course simply sits atop a whole host of other issues there.
Also last week there was further development in Bernard Laporte’s saga which doesn’t look like straying too far from the news cycle, something the FFR could do without in a RWC year.
Although what happened in Italian rugby, namely the disgusting “secret Santa” present, was confined to one club, it was their biggest and surely warranted involvement by the union and the response has been extremely insufficient.
Meanwhile in Scotland the SRU has fallen well short addressing the tragic death of Siobhan Cattigan.
Then there was the RFU making an absolute hames of introducing new tackle laws at lower levels (in every sense), a problem with communication that by all accounts is nothing new over there.
As for Irish rugby? Well perhaps on the surface there’s nothing in the front line news, yet while steps are being taken to improve the Women’s game with professional contracts and new competitions being announced, there is information being put out there by a particular twitter account that suggests a lot more needs to be done.
Each issue is vast and extremely difficult to summarize in an article like this one, but the reason I had a stab at it was to present the overall view from just outside the 6N bubble.
We love rugby on the pitch; I’m writing this article and you’re reading it so that goes without saying. But knowing so much negativity is going on behind the scenes is certainly not acceptable, especially when the governance issues are so widespread. No organisation is ever going to have everything perfect all the time, but what does seem to be a common thread in the above stories is that the failures are in areas where you’d expect to have set standards throughout the sport, something I would have thought a body like World Rugby was there to fix.
SEVENS
Another strong showing by the Irish women, this time reaching another semifinal after an impressive quarterfinal win over Fiji which put some distance between us and them in the overall series standings and keeps us within reach of the top four.
Meanwhile the men also reached the last eight but a couple of early mistakes against the Blitzbokke made a fightback impossible so we are continuing to struggle to match the excellent silver medal in Dubai.
Next on the circuit is Los Angeles for the men at the end of February, while both they and the women join them in Vancouver the following weekend. Without researching I just have to say on the surface it does seem odd that LA can’t provide for a women’s leg in the series.
But that just brings me to the point I always like making when discussing the World Sevens Series…
I hope @WorldRugby7s see that Irish crowd in Sydney and appreciate what kind of atmosphere an Irish leg in the series would have.#Sydney7s#IreM7s
Before I harp on the Men’s AIL, a quick shout out to the Women’s Combined Provinces XV – clunky name I know, but apparently it’s just for the one season as the new Celtic Challenge tournament is meant to expand from one team per nation to two next season. Anyway – they opened their campaign with a 27-26 win away to their Welsh counterparts in the opening match.
Now to Division 1A and in Round 12 there was so much going on at both ends of the table it’s hard to know where to start. I guess it’s best to “take it from the top” as league leaders Terenure suffered only their second defeat of the season, this one at home to rivals Clontarf and with Cork Con also winning, it means just three point separate the top three. Then there’s the race for that fourth semifinal berth as Young Munster scored a home win over Trinity to leap frog them.
But arguably the biggest result of the round was Garryowen finally kicking the duck egg out of their win column by beating Lansdowne, who in turn got dragged back into the relegation battle as UCD also did some leap-frogging, sneaking out of the bottom two at Shannon’s expense.
The clubs now get a couple of weekend’s off to let punters catch the Six Nations in their bars (seriously, if you can, do get down to your local clubs to watch if you can, it really helps them out) and they return to action with some big matchups as you can see below.
Men’s AIL
Cork Con 14-3 Ballynahinch
Garryowen 21-17 Lansdowne
UCD 22-19 Shannon
Young Munster 17-10 Dublin Univ
Terenure 24-29 Clontarf
Sat Feb 18
Ballynahinch v Terenure
Clontarf v Young Munster
Lansdowne v Cork Con
Shannon v Dublin University
UCD v Garryowen
THE NEXT BATCH OF HARPIN’
I’d like to say here “from now on we’re switching into FULL SIX NATIONS MODE for the next couple of months”, but of course I can’t say that because there’s a bit of URC thrown in there plus I have another couple of pods lined up on other topics for good measure.
But still, obvs the bulk of the coverage is going to be on the 6N starting with an overview pod which will record Wednesday evening, then the tournament opener in Cardiff will be getting the usual Harpin treatment with a preview Friday, wrap on Sunday plus a whole lot of other features in between.
In the meantime, be sure to enjoy your rugby wherever you are. JLP
For our first Opposition View pod of 2023 I was delighted to speak to Lee & Rhys from the excellent WRRAP pod about the regions’ season so far plus the Welsh Six Nations squad.
