Any thoughts on the Wales team to play Italy...???

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I believe Roberts is possibly a doubt maybe Williams or beck to start. Rees was out he might be vack. Priestland was a bit off form against England. To be honest we didn't have a good game last week. I think the second row lacked a bit of punch.

Absolutely maesteg. Wales pool play was exceptional given the physicality of that pool. All year i saw welsh posters saying even if they qualify theyll be injured to bits and i thought the same.

But the SA and Samoa matches were awesome and they polished off the rest.

Then were not far off the final and are now the form team of the 6N. With that and the friendlys somewhere someone is doing a lot of things right. Consistency.

With Italy its about showing whos boss. Ok to have close battles with the big boys but just as important to dominate where they should.

I reckon theyll knock 40 easily. can they knock 50? 60?

My guess? 52 point margin.

Not wanting to contradict what we have both said above but respect has to be given to Italy, they are a good and capable team a fifty point margin would be a magnificent marker for Wales but highly improbable unless Italy's just give up and collapse like they did at twickenham last year.

But your sentiment is correct Wales should be aiming to put a very big score on Italy, they should be disappointed with their performance of last week and any less is unsatisfactory.

We don't need to thrash Italy, we just need to win. If Wales do indeed go on to win a GS do you think it maters if we had beaten Italy by 1 point or by 20.

As long as we win, I'm happy. Then we can look forward to winning the 6n's in the last game. Ireland will win their last two games but with one loss and one draw they're out of contention. England won't win another game so they'll be fighting it out for fourth place. Scotland and Italy have already lost too many to be a threat.
France will beat England so the Wales vs France game will be winner takes all. Wales on 8 points and France on 7. Points difference will not come into reckoning as whatever side wins will have more points. A draw means Wales will win. If wales lose, we finish second in the table but have the triple crown. Not as good as a grand slam but not a wasted championship and some thing to take to oz.



So, as I said, beating Italy is all that counts as the extra points mean nothing really.

Taylorman wrote:Absolutely maesteg. Wales pool play was exceptional given the physicality of that pool. All year i saw welsh posters saying even if they qualify theyll be injured to bits and i thought the same.

But the SA and Samoa matches were awesome and they polished off the rest.

Then were not far off the final and are now the form team of the 6N. With that and the friendlys somewhere someone is doing a lot of things right. Consistency.

With Italy its about showing whos boss. Ok to have close battles with the big boys but just as important to dominate where they should.

I reckon theyll knock 40 easily. can they knock 50? 60?

My guess? 52 point margin.

Are you mad?
France 30 v 12 Italy - 18pts
Italy 15 v 19 England - 4pts
Ireland 42 v 10 Italy - 32pts

So..........What makes you think that Wales who havent exactly hammered
Ireland 21-23 Wales - Sexton fairly easy pen miss
Wales 27-13 Scotland - Scotland 2 serious injuries, and 2 yellows (shades of 2010 again)
England 12-19 Wales - Strettle try v no try

So..............based on Italys losing margins and Wales good but not overly convincing performances to-date

Where are you getting the 52 POINT Winning margin from?

40 maybe ................ 52 is perhaps been a tad disrespectful

Yeah I guess it is...ok 40 then. Its at MS and the basis of it is something like this (in terms of consistency)...

Since losing to England last year this Welsh team have only lost to England, France, Oz and SA- all but one (5 losses) 4 points or less. In Sept/ Oct they put 81-7 and 66-0 on Namibia and Fiji. Italy, not being disrespectful, represents the next lowest ranked team they will have played over the last 12 months.

Their style is one that suits punishing weaker teams through wide use of the ball which is just what they did. They havnt been as convincing against the tougher teams admittedly but they have closed some big matches out

52 is a bit high so I'll settle for 40- still setting the bar high but thats the point of this exercise- to set a high standard.

Wales are at home where they'll get huge support. Italy are finishing out the tournament and won't expect to win this. Wales need to tear into Italy and put the lights out early. Thats what great teams do, and I think Wales will go a long way to doing this here.

I've heard rumours that Brunel is thinking of selecting a weakened team to rest his players for the wooden spoon clash with Scotland

I was all for resting Charteris until the summer tour but now he has been included I would like to see him and I Evans have a crack together, 6 ft 10 and 6ft 8 respectively is pretty decent sizing