6N 2016: Wales vs Italy - Super Saturday

First topic message reminder :

Here we go again. Big win for Wales please, and then back to the drawing board.

Saturday, 19 March
Wales v Italy (Principality Stadium, 14:30 GMT)

Wales

Liam Williams; George North, Jonathan Davies, Jamie Roberts, Hallam Amos; Dan Biggar, Rhys Webb; Rob Evans, Scott Baldwin, Samson Lee; Bradley Davies, Luke Charteris; Dan Lydiate (C), Justin Tipuric, Taulupe Faletau.

Replacements: Ken Owens, Gethin Jenkins, Tomas Francis*, Jake Ball, Ross Moriarty, Gareth Davies, Rhys Priestland, Gareth Anscombe.

*Francis is pending disciplinary action, Jarvis is on standby.


Italy

TBC

This tourney is helping North get his confidence back.

Should be good for Saints.

This game is a real hammering.  Shame but cannot blame Wales for weak opponents, they're playing great.

trebellbobaggins wrote:This tourney is helping North get his confidence back.

Should be good for Saints.

This game is a real hammering.  Shame but cannot blame Wales for weak opponents, they're playing great.

Top try scorer, most metres made, most defenders beaten and that was before the Italy game kicked off

Thinking my prediction of a 42 point margin may have been a little conservative now ...

If Wales had got one more point against Ireland and turned the draw into the win, they'd (at 39-0 and time of writing) be 3 points away from overhauling England's points difference and making it "Grand Slam or bust" later this evening.

Shows how fine the margins in this tournament can be.

Excellent work!

An absolute rancid attempt at a tackle by the Italian 14 on Liam.

Bet Bedford will be pleased for North

At least Italy showing a bit of heart anyway.

Wales won't be happy conceding tries to this Italy side.

Well at least theres tries being scored one way or the other. Better than both teams going to sleep.

As long as they don't make a habit of it and mess up my prediction

Evidently it's Italy's turn to score now, lol.

Once they get to a gap of 42 then they can go boobie for tat

Nice work by the AR on the post btw 

This is like a Barbarians game now!

Either side could get a few tries before the end. Defence optional.

Come on Wales - stop messing around

Ross Moriarty has done himself no harm today. Looked dynamic and like he could make an impact against better sides than Italy.

Keith Wood visionary

Got to feel sorry for Italy

Nothing has gone for them. Called back from that intercept to then concede before they were even back to their line.

CoS has a massive, massive, massive challenge on his hands.

JDizzle wrote:Ross Moriarty has done himself no harm today. Looked dynamic and like he could make an impact against better sides than Italy.

Agree. Should have started anyway imo

RiscaGame wrote:Keith Wood visionary

I said at the beginning Keith Wood has it all right

Ouch poor Italy, but at least we played well.

Harsh call on Italy there, looked to be a head high tackle

Soft try after the let down of the disallowed try.  Such a shame.

Congrats Wales.

Now now onto Eng again and then NZ.

Parisse has been so lazy today. When his side are under the cosh he just goes into his shell and sulks these days.

Good win for Wales though

Miserable result for Italy.

If Conor O'Shea is moving to coach them, he's at the bottom of a steep hill.

Italy are an embarrassment to the championship, we need a playoff system to allow Romania, Georgia a chance to join the 6 nations

O'Shea should re think his plans

Nine tries not bad to be fair.

"Sergio what was the difference between the two teams today?"

Yes.

I wouldnt say this Italy team are complacent, but maybe the Italian Rugby Union are. They have their Six Nations spot and their two Pro12 spots, 1 Championship Cup spot and normally get 1 home game against one of the big 3, regardless of results. Maybe a relegation system would threaten that and force them to do more?

Congratulations to Wales though, finished the tournament very strongly. Bigger tests to come, but did all they could have today.

Well deserved MOM award for George North, his best performance for some time.

Next up the best clash of the day hopefully.

Job done Wales. Well done. Italy very poor.

Yeah I'm pleased but we didn't do it against England or Ireland, in fact we hit no where near that level, except against by far the weakest team who are injury ravaged and in disarray.

Well done Wales, some lovely tries.

I think that win may gloss over the lack of performance from the England game though

Can't believe Poite didn't put Italy out of their misery too by restarting when time was up - I know technically the conversion was taken with a second to go but jeez, talk about kicking a team when they are down.  

Plus annoyingly that cost me a half margin point in Superbru ...

Heaf wrote:Can't believe Poite didn't put Italy out of their misery too by restarting when time was up - I know technically the conversion was taken with a second to go but jeez, talk about kicking a team when they are down.  

Plus annoyingly that cost me a half margin point in Superbru ...

I was thinking the same thing, and then play continued for an extra two minutes!!

aucklandlaurie wrote:

Heaf wrote:Can't believe Poite didn't put Italy out of their misery too by restarting when time was up - I know technically the conversion was taken with a second to go but jeez, talk about kicking a team when they are down.  

Plus annoyingly that cost me a half margin point in Superbru ...

I was thinking the same thing, and then play continued for an extra two minutes!!

Well the ball didn't go out of play, so the referee had no reason to blow the whistle.

Hard to judge that performance against what was a very poor Italian side but it was good to see ux finally run some tries in and prove that if you do keep ball in hand it works.

I still think JD isn't nowhere near the level he was before injury and whilst Roberts has been a huge player for us in the past and I have been a huge fan of his we now need to look at evolving that No12 spot.

It will be interesting to see how JD and Sc Williams go next year again and is maybe someone like Anscombe and option at 12?

I thought North was very good today and is getting back to his best form also I thought Moriarty had a great game and offers us something different in the backrow to what we currently have.

North has been good attack wise all tournament Beds. Stats don't lie

RiscaGame wrote:North has been good attack wise all tournament Beds. Stats don't lie

Yeah he's really rediscovering his form which is good to see, it must have been worrying for him after all those knocks.

This has been a great tournament for halfpenny. Having played three wingers alongside north and none shining, it looks like once halfpenny's back Liam williams will get shunted outside and halfpenny back at full back

True Raven wrote:This has been a great tournament for halfpenny. Having played three wingers alongside north and none shining, it looks like once halfpenny's back Liam williams will get shunted outside and halfpenny back at full back

Thought exactly that myself

RiscaGame wrote:

True Raven wrote:This has been a great tournament for halfpenny.  Having played three wingers alongside north and none shining, it looks like once halfpenny's back Liam williams will get shunted outside and halfpenny back at full back

Thought exactly that myself

Amos didn't get much chance today but when Halfpenny does come back I would still be tempted to put him on wing leave Williams at XV

bedfordwelsh wrote:

RiscaGame wrote:

True Raven wrote:This has been a great tournament for halfpenny.  Having played three wingers alongside north and none shining, it looks like once halfpenny's back Liam williams will get shunted outside and halfpenny back at full back

Thought exactly that myself

Amos didn't get much chance today but when Halfpenny does come back I would still be tempted to put him on wing leave Williams at XV

Nah not for me, williams hasn't played any better in these five games attacking wise than halfpenny has done at 15 for Wales, difference for me is halfpenny's defence, despite technically questionable, is positionally better.

I only brought up halfpenny because Amos being dragged off after 45 mins was telling. I like Amos and think he'll be an asset to the squad in the future but I don't think he'll be gatlands first choice winger for a while

Amos wasn't helped much today, but then north looked busier too.

True Raven wrote:

bedfordwelsh wrote:

RiscaGame wrote:

True Raven wrote:This has been a great tournament for halfpenny.  Having played three wingers alongside north and none shining, it looks like once halfpenny's back Liam williams will get shunted outside and halfpenny back at full back

Thought exactly that myself

Amos didn't get much chance today but when Halfpenny does come back I would still be tempted to put him on wing leave Williams at XV

Nah not for me, williams hasn't played any better in these five games attacking wise than halfpenny has done at 15 for Wales, difference for me is halfpenny's defence, despite technically questionable, is positionally better.  

I only brought up halfpenny because Amos being dragged off after 45 mins was telling.  I like Amos and think he'll be an asset to the squad in the future but I don't think he'll be gatlands first choice winger for a while

I just wish Williams and Halfpenny had the sense to, or even given the freedom to switch through the game.

RiscaGame wrote:Amos wasn't helped much today, but then north looked busier too.

Amos clearly isn't a child of Gatland.

He wouldn't have taken cuthbert off. Anscombe was pretty average too, despite the game opening up.

I've always thought JD2 was quite the overhyped player. He hasn't been up to much all tournament, in fact he's been fairly average. Today he was just awful. I have no idea why people are talking about dropping Roberts going forward, when he's one of our best players and leaders? Going forward our best midfield is Roberts and Morgan.

PS let's not hear anything more about how we might have scored against 13-man Aus in the World Cup had JD2 been starting. He's always been crap at passing and today confirms that.

Surely Scott Williams is above tyler Morgan?