Six Nations Roundup

This weekend saw the second round of six nations games held in Twickenham, Murrayfield and Stadio Olimpico with some results having been easy to predict and others not so much. The table standings now have a neat structure of 2 wins for England and Wales, one victory each for Scotland and Ireland and a run of two losses for France and Italy. Sitting top of the table makes England favourites to win but with three more weekends of matches ahead there is still all to play for, and FreeTips.com takes a look at what has gone down and what is yet to come.
This weekend saw England triumph at home with a confident 44-8 over opponents France. Damian Penaud secured the only try for the French team with May, Farrell and Slade all pushing up the points for England, the man of the match Jonny May, in particular, securing six tries and a hat-trick move in the first half hour. Meanwhile in Murrayfield things were little closer to call with Ireland eventually taking the victory with 22 points over Scotlands 13. The game was eventful and saw a significant injury to the face of Johnny Sexton, which hopefully won’t hinder his match in two weeks time. Finally over in Rome, Wales managed a fairly confident win over home team Italy which made this their 11th victory in a row, a new team achievement never seen before. This leaves England at the top with Wales second, Scotland third, Ireland fourth, France in fifth and Italy languishing at the bottom with a -24 points difference and work to do if they want to move up.
In a fortnight the games will take place in France as the team take on Scotland, Wales as England play away, meaning one of the two teams will lose their unbeaten record for this tournament and in Rome Italy host Ireland. Currently, the odds to win are an easy bet on Scotland and Ireland with the Wales-England game being much harder to call as both teams are playing well and proving hard to beat.
Round four sees a new rotation of Scotland, England and Ireland at home to Wales, Italy and France respectively with the home team tipped as the favourite in all cases except Scotland v Wales. Confidence here will vary depending on whether Wales manage to defeat England in round three, and this is a tougher game to call as both teams are reasonably well matched, although if victorious Wales would undoubtedly be full of bluster coming into the match.
The last round sees all remaining combinations in play with France off to Rome, Ireland heading to Wales and Scotland playing at Twickenham. Again the home teams look tipped for victory with only Italy-France being hard to all as neither side has led well and both sit at the bottom of the table with a significant point difference compared to the other four. However, at this stage, things can change quickly, and it remains a wide-open contest with the final placings far from determined.