Rugby Union Six Nations 2007

[Cymro]

Hi All, Been a long time lurker on this site with the occasional post. Good to see more and more rugby threads on here so I thought why not get some information together on the 6N. Not a fantastic betting tournament I admit but from all the knowledge that is apparent on here we should be able to pick out some nice bets. Latest odds from bet365 are as follows (not sure how to get one of those updating odds tables on the site so if someone could oblige I'd appreciate it, also making the thread a sticky might help): Ireland 6/4 France 11/5 England 7/2 Wales 11/2 Scotland 25/1 Italy 150/1 If we have enough contributors from different countries on here it would be great for each to give their views on their own country (think we may struggle for France and Italy but who knows?). In general terms I see this being a very close and interesting championship with the top 3 in the betting all being capable of beating each other, and Wales and Scotland able to spring a surprise as in recent years. To kick things off I'll give my assessment of Wales' chances. Wales (11/2) 4th Feb Wales vs Ireland 15:00 10th Feb Scotland vs Wales 15:30 24th Feb France vs Wales 20:00 10th March Italy vs Wales 15:30 17th March Wales vs England 17:30 Amazing to think that two years ago this set of fixtures (albeit in a different order) culminated in a surprising but scintillating Grand Slam from the Welsh fans' point of view. Ask any rugby fan in Wales now and they would probably expect no more than two wins from this campaign such is the paucity of our squad following a few injuries and the apparent lack of gameplan under Gareth Jenkins. The two home games are looking tougher and tougher with each passing day and the Ireland game is obviously critical to any hope we have of competing for the title. Even with our best team out I would expect us to struggle against Ireland, as I mentioned there seems to be no direction under Jenkins whereas Ireland know what they have to do and do it well (as their comprehensive victories over Ireland and South Africa showed). The only bright spark at the moment for Wales is Hook but outside him there doesn't appear to be anyone in form, fitness or indeed playing in their rightful position. I'm not even convinced he should be 12 but in the circumstances there is no alternative - the injury situation is so bad we have to choose between Hal Luscombe and Jamie Robinson at outside centre both of whom should not be near the Wales team at present and against D'Arcy and O'Driscoll could get torn to pieces. Another problem for Wales is a certain G Henson, on current form he shouldn't be considered for international rugby yet due to the injuries to others that are well documented he could end up fullback for at least the first game. I've never seen a player so disinterested when things start going wrong but no one seems to have the bottle to drop him for club or country - a kick up the arse is what this boy needs! So... I hope I've made it clear our backs are not going to set the world alight, as for the forwards I think we have fairly impressive front and back rows (with good cover on the bench) but without the grunt in the second row the pack lacks a bit of cohesion. Again, injuries are a problem here. I think our scrum will hold up against most others but we are unlikely to shove people around, and without Sidoli and Evans in the lineout our problems in this area will most likely continue. From a betting perspective I can only see a surprise coming against England (and that is assuming their form does not improve markedly which I suspect may well happen). There may be a few inflated handicaps later on if we lose against Ireland but I would say there is absolutely no value in Wales at the moment. If anything the value is in England but that seems to be disappearing. Will hopefully get the chance to post in detail later in the week, for now though it would be great to hear other fans' views.

[rhodri]

Re: Rugby Union Six Nations 2007 i might hav a few quid each way with jason robinson 17-1 with 365 for top try scorer, shane williams 16-1 but may be injured for sunday welsh team to be named on thursday