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Six Nations 2023

The men's and under 20 tournaments start this weekend, as rugby gets its couple of months on the big stage. It's a massive men's tournament this year before the world cup this autumn, with new, returning coaches for England and Wales and France and Ireland vying to be the world's best team. Meanwhile Italy finished last year's tournament with their first win since 2015 and are looking competitive again, and Scotland are inconsistent as ever but with a squad able to challenge.

2023 Men's Fixtures

Wales v Ireland, Sat 4th Feb @ 14:15 (BBC One/S4C)
England v Scotland, Sat 4th Feb @ 16:45 (ITV1)
Italy v France, Sun 5th Feb @ 15:00 (ITV1)

Scotland v Wales, Sat 11th Feb @ 14:15 (BBC One/S4C)
Ireland v France, Sat 11th Feb @ 16:45 (ITV1)
England v Italy, Sun 12th Feb @ 15:00 (ITV1)

Italy v Ireland, Sat 25th Feb @ 14:15 (ITV1)
Wales v England, Sat 25th Feb @ 16:45 (BBC One/S4C)
France v Scotland, Sun 26th Feb @ 15:00 (ITV1)

Italy v Wales, Sat 11th Mar @ 14:15 (ITV1/S4C)
England v France, Sat 11th Mar @ 16:45 (ITV1)
Scotland v Ireland, Sun 12th Mar @ 15:00 (BBC One)

Scotland v Italy, Sat 18th Mar @ 12:30 (BBC One)
France v Wales, Sat 18th Mar @ 14:45 (ITV1/S4C)
Ireland v England, Sat 18th Mar @ 17:00 (ITV1)

That will be immediately followed by the women's tournament, which is taking place in the wake of the world cup last autumn. England will be looking to make amends for losing the final in the last minute, and are taking the France game to Twickenham, the first time that a standalone women's Test match is being played there. Otherwise the focus will be on bringing through the next generation of players, and seeing the impact of professionalism beginning in Wales, Ireland, Scotland and Italy.

2023 Women's Fixtures

Wales v Ireland, Sat 25th Mar @ 14:15
England v Scotland, Sat 25th Mar @ 16:45
Italy v France, Sun 26th Mar @ 14:00

Ireland v France, Sat 1st Apr @ 15:15
Scotland v Wales, Sat 1st Apr @ 17:30
England v Italy, Sun 2nd Apr @ 15:00

Wales v England, Sat 15th Apr @ 14:15
Italy v Ireland, Sat 15th Apr @ 16:45
France v Scotland, Sun 16th Apr @ 15:15

Ireland v England, Sat 22nd Apr @ 14:15
Scotland v Italy, Sat 18th Apr @ 16:45
France v Wales, Sat 18th Apr @ 15:15

England v France, Sat 29th Apr @ 13:00
Italy v Wales, Sat 29th Apr @ 15:30
Scotland v Ireland, Sat 29th Apr @ 19:30

Reply 1

Saracen's Fez

Owen Farrell avatar deployed

Here are the teams for Saturday's games!

Ireland: Hugo Keenan; Mack Hansen, Garry Ringrose, Stuart McCloskey, James Lowe; Johnny Sexton (c), Jamison Gibson-Park; Andrew Porter, Dan Sheehan, Finlay Bealham; Tadhg Beirne, James Ryan; Peter O'Mahony, Josh van der Flier, Caelan Doris.
Replacements: Rob Herring, Cian Healy, Tom O'Toole, Iain Henderson, Jack Conan, Conor Murray, Ross Byrne, Bundee Aki.
Wales: Liam Williams; Josh Adams, George North, Joe Hawkins, Rio Dyer; Dan Biggar, Tomos Williams; Gareth Thomas, Ken Owens (c), Tomas Francis, Adam Beard, Alun Wyn Jones, Jac Morgan, Justin Tipuric, Taulupe Faletau.
Replacements: Scott Baldwin, Rhys Carré, Dillon Lewis, Dafydd Jenkins, Tommy Reffell, Rhys Webb, Owen Williams, Alex Cuthbert.

England: Freddie Steward; Max Malins, Joe Marchant, Owen Farrell (c), Ollie Hassell-Collins; Marcus Smith, Jack van Poortvliet; Ellis Genge, Jamie George, Kyle Sinckler, Maro Itoje, Ollie Chessum, Lewis Ludlam, Ben Curry, Alex Dombrandt.
Replacements: Jack Walker, Mako Vunipola, Dan Cole, Nick Isiekwe, Ben Earl, Ben Youngs, Ollie Lawrence, Anthony Watson.
Scotland: Stuart Hogg; Kyle Steyn, Huw Jones, Sione Tuipulotu, Duhan van der Merwe; Finn Russell, Ben White; Pierre Schoeman, George Turner, WP Nel; Richie Gray, Grant Gilchrist; Jamie Ritchie (c), Luke Crosbie, Matt Fagerson.
Replacements: Fraser Brown, Jamie Bhatti, Simon Berghan, Jonny Gray, Jack Dempsey, George Horne, Blair Kinghorn, Chris Harris.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 2

Saracen's Fez

And here are the teams for Sunday – France looking absolutely stacked:

Italy: Ange Capuozzo; Pierre Bruno, Juan Ignacio Brex, Luca Morisi, Tommaso Me*****llo; Tommaso Allan, Stephen Varney; Danilo Fischetti, Giacomo Nicotera, Simone Ferrari, Niccolò Cannone, Federico Ruzza, Sebastian Negri, Michele Lamaro (capt), Lorenzo Cannone.
Replacements: Luca Bigi, Federico Zani, Pietro Ceccarelli, Edoardo Iachizzi, Giovanni Pettinelli, Manuel Zuliani, Alessandro Fusco, Edoardo Padovani.
France: Thomas Ramos; Damian Penaud, Gaël Fickou, Yoram Moefana, Ethan Dumortier; Romain Ntamack, Antoine Dupont (capt); Cyril Baille, Julien Marchand, Uini Atonio, Thibaud Flament, Paul Willemse, Anthony Jelonch, Charles Ollivon, Gregory Alldritt.
Replacements: Gaëtan Barlot, Reda Wardi, Sipili Falatea, Romain Taofifenua, Thomas Lavault, Sekou Macalou, Nolann Le Garrec, Matthieu Jalibert.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 3

Saracen's Fez

Wales 10-34 Ireland

An incredibly fast start for Ireland, going 27-3 up in the first half, before Wales had most of the territory in the second half. They threatened many times but blew most of their chances, before Ireland had a mini-renaissance at the end.

Not the start to the second Warren Gatland era that Wales wanted – and it's clear the problems ran much deeper than Wayne Pivac's coaching. And I said at the start of the weekend that Ireland would either be shocked here or go on and win the Grand Slam – I stand by that after today.

Reply 4

Saracen's Fez

England 23-29 Scotland

Again :rolleyes:

This one felt a lot more like a good contest between two well-matched teams than the last couple of England losses in this fixture. If today had a theme, it's that sacking your coach isn't the solution to all of your problems, even if it's still nice to have moved on from the Eddie Jones era and the coverage around the match and the result reflects that.

For Scotland, the big question is whether they can back this up. It's all well and good this fixture being their world cup final and them going on and underperforming for the rest of the tournament – they've got a big test against Wales next weekend to show that they can back this win up.