Men's Six Nations 2026, Week 5

Fairly unusually all of these games are of interest, at least potentially, to the neutral average punter and not just fans of the various teams and the tragics.

The victor of Ireland v Scotland will win the Triple Crown and might win the Six Nations. Then, if Italy win, it’s their first time winning three games in a single tournament. If Wales win with a bonus point they can consign England to last place, any win breaks their three year Six Nations losing streak. There are neutrals who probably want any of those outcomes just about equally. In the final match, depending on the exact result of the first one, a French victory, maybe with a bonus point, wins them the Six Nations for this year, and a big win possibly consigns England to a wooden spoon.

The Games

Scotland v Ireland

After ripping up the script and putting 50 points on France last week, can Scotland back it up and beat Ireland to win the Triple Crown and potentially the Six Nations? For the first 15 minutes or so, each entry into 22 led to a try, two to Ireland, one to Scotland. But on the next Scottish entry, the Irish defence showed up, turned the ball over and a new story started to emerge. Ireland scored again before 20 minutes were up, then the defences took over. 19-7 at halftime.

In the second half, it took about ten minutes to get going, then the scoring started, tit-for-tat, Scotland, Ireland, Scotland, Ireland. The first three within ten minutes and making the Scots dream, the last of those four another ten minutes later, effectively ending it. Ireland would score again just before the end with Russell looking for anything, and Tuipulotu heading the ball forward. 41-21 is a harsh final score for the way the match ebbed and flowed, but that’s what happened.

If we ignore the last try, which came because Scotland were forcing the game, and look at 34-21, which is still a comfortable win for Ireland, I think it’s fair to ask two questions. Were Ireland this good because they were at home and lifted by the crowd or genuinely this classy? I’m not really sure. Equally, Scotland had two big performances at home this year, against England (which is pretty much expected of them), and France (which is not). Then they collapsed, not to zero, but they were definitely flatter the following week. Are they lifted that much by the Murrayfield crowd or are they just that inconsistent? Again I don’t have answers to that, but they need to sort it out. Both these teams are at a point where they should be beyond this but it looks suspiciously like they’re appreciably better at home.

Ireland win the Triple Crown again, France just need to win.

Italy v Wales

This match, if you’re Welsh, started in the best possible way. Try after try after try. Although it changed by the end, at one point Wales had three entries into the Italian 22 for 21 points, while Italy had two entries into the Welsh 22 for zero. Indeed, that score was the way the first half finished. The Italians looked like they might have celebrated a bit too much after their historic win over England, whilst Wales looked like they were continuing their upward arc.

After halftime, Wales scored first, and although there was a fair bit of time to go, even through the TV it felt like it was game over. The match didn’t end of course but a lot of the intensity drained away for a period. When it came back, Wales scored a sumptuous drop goal, Italy scored three tries and the Welsh defence stopped them from scoring two more and delayed one of the others with some brutal defensive efforts.

The game ended 31-21 and I’m happy that Italy ended on a relative high, looking good despite the loss. But the story is Wales' first win in three years in the Six Nations. Every aspect of their game is so much better than five weeks ago. Italy probably outplayed them at scrum time, although it wasn’t totally one-sided. However, even when Italy were fighting their way back into the game Wales looked better than Italy in all the other parts of the game. The breakdown became more of a contest in the second half but I think Wales still edged it.

Last week Wales started showing signs of their old defensive steel. This week that was there in almost full force. There are still players with work to do, LRZ is learning how to play fullback, but he’s improving week by week, and parts of his game are already excellent. Mee and Hawkins have great moments and poorer ones too. However, this week there was no five minutes where they turned off, which is good.

Italy will be disappointed on the day but have achieved a lot. Wales have improved vastly over the tournament, and have started to find names in all areas of the team who can carry them forward for the next few years. Since 2023 it hasn’t felt like there’s been a team, not even really the nucleus of one. Now, even without Morgan being fit, there are players starting to emerge who feel like they'll fit that mould and give us hope going forward.

If I awarded a breakout player of the tournament, and possibly face of the tournament, Rhys Carré would get them both! Menoncello has to be in with a shout for POTT.

France v England

This match was crazy. England threw out Borthwick's plans from the whole of his tenure in charge so far - for example, there was not a single box kick in the French half - and they tried running big carriers at the French defence until gaps appeared, then trusted the distributors to select the right player to score. This is pretty much what Scotland did the week before and they ran up 50 points on the French. England ran up 46. We'll circle back to that. Without the kick, kick, kick shackles from on high England looked potent, in attack at least. Depressingly so. Defence coaches around the world will sit up and take notice of this, but they will also wonder if Borthwick will throw out four years of plans and try to institute a new system in the 18 months before the World Cup.

On the other side, France also scored tries, seemingly for fun. Whenever England gave them the ball, they scored. That’s not quite true, but it felt like it. LBB scored four tries, becoming the first player ever to score in every game of two successive Six Nations, and somehow scoring his first test hat trick. Genge got sin binned, for bringing down a maul that was charging to the corner and about a metre out, that was also a penalty try. Whilst he was on the naughty chair England gave up two more tries. Somehow England fans aren’t blaming him for the loss, but Chessum who intercepted a pass and ran it in, but not close enough to the posts for Smith to make the conversion. It was noticeable that England box kicked more in their own half, which isn’t necessarily a bad tactic, but they were awful at recovering the kicks and never really changed to kicking for distance which, even with the French back three, might have been smarter. The thing they kept trying didn’t work, they didn’t try anything new. That was smart…

We have to talk about the French defence, the Edwards' defence. For over 20 years he’s been one of the very best defensive coaches in the world. Whilst he was at Wales they routinely kept opponents under 20 points and scored often 21 occasionally as much as 25 to win games. They actually won one grand slam conceding zero tries. Last year Ireland conceded 12 and that’s considered an unmatchable record in the modern era. Over the last few years, partly with law changes, partly with some tactical changes, that points limit Edwards has as a target has crept up to more like 30, obviously requiring scoring 30+ to win. In the last two games, France conceded almost 100 points! That’s more than three games worth of points, probably more than four games worth of points that Edwards would like to allow. Why? Now, I think some allowance has to be made for the changes in personnel. Some of those are through choice: Galthié has had a “light” and a “heavy” pack which he’s moved between on a tactical basis, and if I were in his position I’d probably have done the same, the choice certainly seemed sensible. But, in the forwards and the backs, there have been changes forced through injury, and a suspension. That’s not unusual of course, every team has done that to some extent, but France has been hit hard in the back row and centres. They’re typically the positions at the top of the tackling charts and if you’re always rotating them, disrupting the partnerships and understanding, having it make mistakes if you keep pounding it, and not make turnovers before it fails becomes more common. I think there probably are issues beyond that, but I also think Edwards and Galthié have a track record that suggests they’ll be able to work it out.

The match itself swung back and forth. It ended with a high tension kick from Ramos, clock in the red, and some debate about where the penalty was. At least one England fan I know was livid at the way Itoje carried on at the ref and thought he was lucky not to have England marched 10m closer to the posts. Of course Ramos kicked the points, it went straight over the dot, and his 100% kicking record was maintained. France win, take the championship and the glory. Equally, England crash to a won one, lost four record, they’ve only won one three times over the history of the whole four, five and six nations.

LBB, who equalled his own try-scoring record and broke his involvements record (tries plus assists), and Ramos for being the highest points scorer, that nerveless final kick and some of his other moments across the championship would be my other POTT nominees. Personally, although LBB might have had more moments, with all his tries, Ramos had more, bigger moments and is my personal winner.

I will do a full review over the five rounds soon.

Happy Coaches

1. Tandy. Wales' first win in the M6N in three years and both parts of the game plan being on display for the first time, under Tandy, yes, but on a bigger scale since the RWC quarterfinal in 2023.
2. Galthié. A third M6N championship. Records for LBB and Ramos. The resilience to find a way to beat England despite giving up 46 points. Overall, Dupont and Jalibert working together. Whilst parts of the team feel old and familiar, despite LBB still being a baby, but they brought a load of players with under ten caps into the squad and, except against Scotland (where they still scored 40 points remember) they did a job.
3. Farrell. Although I’m not as impressed by Ireland’s results as some, except against England, I think playing at home helped paper over the cracks, I think Farrell will be justifiably happy with a Triple Crown.
4. Quesada. On the day Italy will be disappointed with the loss. But the fight back was good, and the emotional flatness after beating England is probably to be expected. Italy are definitely better than last year. They need to work on playing better away, but unlike Ireland and Scotland they’re definitely on an upward trajectory, having that as the next target is ok.
5. Townsend. Scotland had hopes of a Triple Crown and a chance of a M6N championship. They didn’t exactly fold, but they didn’t turn up. Disappointing.
6. Borthwick. England have only won one game in this championship, for the third time ever. The only game they won playing his system was against a Welsh side that self-destructed. Against France, whether it was player-power or came from him, England suddenly looked potent in attack, but their defensive frailties, their weaknesses under the kick - you still need to kick to get out of your half sometimes - and their lack of discipline cost them the game. There’s very little good for him.

Looking Ahead

Obviously this was the final round of this year’s M6N. In July we move into the Nation's Championship. The Six Nations teams travel to the “Southern Hemisphere” (SAANZAR + Fiji & Japan, which sort of makes sense, but there are some long potential trips in there), playing one match per week against three different opponents. In November the other half of the matches will be played.

So, to pick two examples, France will tour (in order) New Zealand, Australia and Japan, then host Fiji, South Africa and Argentina. Meanwhile Wales will tour Fiji, Argentina then South Africa (that’s some travel schedule), then host Japan, New Zealand and Australia.

This is the first time this competition has run, and part of me wishes it the best, but part of me is looking at some of the issues and wondering just what the organisers were smoking.