6N Round 3: Scotland v Italy, 28 February

First topic message reminder :

  
SCOTLAND v ITALY
Saturday 28 February 2015
KO 14:30 (GMT)
BT Murrayfield, Edinburgh

Live on BBC1

Referee: George Clancy (IRFU)
AR1: Romain Poite (FFR)
AR2: Leighton Hodges (WRU)
TMO: Graham Hughes (RFU)

A. Teams:

1. SCOTLAND

15 Stuart Hogg
14 Tommy Seymour
13 Mark Bennett
12 Alex Dunbar
11 Sean Lamont
10 Peter Horne
09 Greig Laidlaw (capt)

01 Alasdair Dickinson
02 Ross Ford
03 Euan Murray
04 Tim Swinson
05 Jonny Gray
06 Rob Harley
07 Blair Cowan
08 Johnnie Beattie

16 Fraser Brown
17 Ryan Grant
18 Geoff Cross
19 Ben Toolis
20 Hamish Watson
21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne
22 Greig Tonks
23 Matt Scott

2. ITALY

15 Luke McLean
14 Michele Visentin
13 Luca Morisi
12 Enrico Bacchin
11 Giovambattista Venditti
10 Kelly Haimona
09 Edoardo Gori

01 Matias Aguero
02 Leonardo Ghiraldini
03 Dario Chistolini
04 George Fabio Biagi
05 Joshua Furno
06 Francesco Minto
07 Simone Favaro
08 Sergio Parisse (capt)

16 Andrea Manici
17 Alberto De Marchi
18 Lorenzo Cittadini
19 Marco Fuser
20 Samuela Vunisa
21 Guglielmo Palazzani
22 Tommaso Allan
23 Giulio Bisegni.

B. Form (last 4 games):

1. SCOTLAND

15/02/15 - Scotland 23 - 26 Wales

07/02/15 - France 15 - 8 Scotland

22/11/14 - Scotland 37 - 12 Tonga

15/11/14 - Scotland 16 - 24 New Zealand

2. ITALY

14/02/15 - England 47 - 17 Italy

07/02/15 - Italy 3 - 26 Ireland

22/11/14 - Italy 6–22 South Africa

14/11/14 - Italy 18–20 Argentina

C. Head to Head:

21 Played 21

14 Wins 7

7 Losses 14

0 Draws 0

40 Tries 28

30 Conversions 23

58 Penalties 50

5 Drop Goals 6

475 Points 365

No 7&1/2 wrote:Because Scotland have at least had recent history of being winners. They're also building a potentially very good team. Perhaps I'm just being funny you chose so a way of describing a good performance that eneded in defeat but I suppose it's not your first language so don't quite get it.

no, just a different way to look at the things. It's not all about winning or losing for me, but how you did it matters.
Of course I realize statistics is just winning or losing, so practically I'm wrong, we lost, end of it.

Riskysports wrote:Until Scotland winning we are losers

FACT

Valiant my butttttttt

LOSERS - that is us

And I will stick with that until we win

Then we will be WINNERS

Only LOSERS spent time finding and remembering aspects within a game that was good - WINNERS just have to look at the final score

Hopefully after this week end, we will be WINNERS

hopefully my dark, furry arse...

funnyExiledScot wrote:RiskySports doing a fine impression of the Reverend IM Jolly as always.

Best opening to a sermon:

"God's creation is a contrast of dark and light, sadness and happiness, and it is the sadness that I wish to dwell on in my sermon today".

I am a grumpy bugger just now

Once we win the World cup, I will be happier :-)

Riskysports wrote:

funnyExiledScot wrote:RiskySports doing a fine impression of the Reverend IM Jolly as always.

Best opening to a sermon:

"God's creation is a contrast of dark and light, sadness and happiness, and it is the sadness that I wish to dwell on in my sermon today".

I am a grumpy bugger just now

Once we win the World cup, I will be happier :-)

well thats you kinda fecked really!

I think Risky's mood is appropriate in a sense. There does come a time for thinking enough is enough. Too many false dawns. Too many periods when 'enough for now' melted away to 'not enough once more'.

So I don't think his anger is real anger - but more that growing inner defiance that he hopes is in the minds of all Scottish players and coaches to make this 'yet another attempt' be the real beginnings of a real fight back and will bring real results against noteworthy opponents.

It's that 'anger' that kinda arrives when you least expect it, when things are going fine enough but you get the sudden fear that too much happiness could drag the whole project back to apathy.

Risky is greedy.

Now......................... after saying all that. Please leave us off the platter this year. Beat us next year if you want but leave us alone this year. We have plans and we don't want Scotland scuppering them again! Beat England first. Then Wales. Then come after us.

SecretFly wrote:I think Risky's mood is appropriate in a sense.  There does come a time for thinking enough is enough.  Too many false dawns.  Too many periods when 'enough for now' melted away to 'not enough once more'.

So I don't think his anger is real anger - but more that growing inner defiance that he hopes is in the minds of all Scottish players and coaches to make this 'yet another attempt' be the real beginnings of a real fight back and will bring real results against noteworthy opponents.

It's that 'anger' that kinda arrives when you least expect it, when things are going fine enough but you get the sudden fear that too much happiness could drag the whole project back to apathy.

Risky is greedy.

Now......................... after saying all that.  Please leave us off the platter this year.  Beat us next year if you want but leave us alone this year.  We have plans and we don't want Scotland scuppering them again!  Beat England first.  Then Wales.  Then come after us.

Not greedy, just fat!

Good to see Denton and Ashe involved this week and hopefully playing again next week - I feel a lot better about our back row options knowing they'll be available for selection against England.

RDW_Scotland wrote:Good to see Denton and Ashe involved this week and hopefully playing again next week - I feel a lot better about our back row options knowing they'll be available for selection against England.

6,Denton, 8,Beattie, 7, Ashe, backrow at twickers? fullfilling Scott Johnsons wildest dreams?

Good to see Scotland under 20s pumping the Italians! 26-0 after half time.

They seem to be a good bunch this year.

Full time under 20s win 45-0!

Fantastic result for the youngsters. They need to keep the spirit going, and hopefully there will be more of the same tomorrow.

45-0 Great result Anyone see it ?

http://www.scotsman.com/sport/rugby/latest/scotland-45-0-netherlands-young-forwards-dominate-1-3704735

The headline a particularly proud moment for the Hootsmon's editorial monkeys.

The Hootsman are a laughing stock tbh . Sounds like Fagerson and Hornee Jnr had a good un !

I hope you guys will forgive me spouting a little bit of awesome news. Not quite up there with RDW's loss of freedom and FES's loss of any free time, but after five years of trying, five years of gimping as a lowly paralegal, I have just secured a training contract with a law firm in Newcastle.

Yes, IanBru will be a solicitor.

Congrats to you IanBru.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/31665264

Interview with Tommy Seymour, talk of a line in the sand when VC took over. This is good and also explains, rightly in my opinion, why a few players synonymous with a losing Scottish team had to be left behind. It does not mean they were not good players, just that the team needed to move on and that meant changes needed to be made.

I know we have heard a lot of the other stuff before, but it does seem to have a better tone to it this time and the performances, albeit they were still losing ones, looked like they meant it to.

I am positive about things!

Not too long before kick-off for the 'big one' now... I can't wait...

IanBru wrote:I hope you guys will forgive me spouting a little bit of awesome news. Not quite up there with RDW's loss of freedom and FES's loss of any free time, but after five years of trying, five years of gimping as a lowly paralegal, I have just secured a training contract with a law firm in Newcastle.

Yes, IanBru will be a solicitor.

Well done Ian. You're becoming quite the nomad though.
Will you be domiciled in Noocassel in time for the World Cup? Just a thought, I would hate to think of you being lonely in a big unfriendly city.
p.s. Try to find a pub that serves Nookie Broon Exhibition Ale on draught. They only do itin about a five mile radius of the brewery but it is excellent.
and well done again.

The Saint wrote:Not too long before kick-off for the 'big one' now... I can't wait...

Thanks Saint.

I secretly can't wait for France to totally pump Wales a new hoop.

Well done Bru BTW!!

Allez les blue. In both matches.

Tattie Scones RRN wrote:

The Saint wrote:Not too long before kick-off for the 'big one' now... I can't wait...

Thanks Saint.

I secretly can't wait for France to totally pump Wales a new hoop.

Well done Bru BTW!!

You're one of many that can't wait. It's natural to hate teams that spend a fair amount of time winning this tournament. Keep on hating .

Inverdale thinks Castro getting his face chewed on by a dog is hilarious for some reason.

When a team has been in a prolonged slump the turning of the corner can seem to take an age. With a bit of luck, Scotland would likely have won last week, even with the mistakes they made. This week they meet an Italy who play better against Scotland than any other side in the 6Ns and have enough talent to win. Sport has a habit of being cruel when you are down, and it would not surprise me a bit if some unheard of combination of events caused Scotland to lose again.

My point is that even if Scotland lose, this Scottish side has more about it than any I've seen in a decade. It'll come.

The real joke is, of course, Inverdales appalling scarf.

Tattie Scones RRN wrote:

The Saint wrote:Not too long before kick-off for the 'big one' now... I can't wait...

Thanks Saint.

You will have to forgive Saint. He is one of Wales less intelligent rugby fans

This could be an interesting match. I think Italy are better than given credit and Scotland are missing a few players.

Would have like to have seen the Scots go for touch and contest the line out there...

How could Haimona not see Bennet there

Lol, oh well...

Straight out the Tommy Seymour play book

First of mark Bennett's record breaking number of six nations tries

That was some drive from Italy, could be a very high scoring match this.

Two tries that you think, geez it shouldn't be that easy!

Great drive from Italy though.

Ouch.

Conceding a maul try from that range does NOT look good.

Typical Scotland. Do something good, then back it up with a basic error and give away a try. Well done Lamont you donkey

All because we can't take a restart!

Come on Italy keep it up

Clancy reffing well, I'd say. Not something I'm used to saying!

Thought he got the ball before going off his feet there myself...

He is very pedantic

Another restart mess up!

Haimona looks too slow to me when kicking. Has a very lazy style about him.

Er, it looked to me as though Parisse fired a poor pass at ankle height (re commentary on Parisse's genius)

It wasn't a bad pass and the option was on but it needed a back there with far more awareness than a forward.

Having said Italy play well against Scotland, they are actually playing really badly. Worse than against England, for example. Mostly, it's unforced errors.

Agree about the option Parisse chose being a good one, just seemed to me execution was poor.

Scotland really need to stop kicking possession away. They should be targeting Haimona's channel as he is very slow. Poor Luke McLean is having to play fullback and 10 to cover him.

There is a lot of Italian makes half break then passes to no one action

It amazing what a clean side Scotland can be when Dan Bigger isn't playing against them

Steffan wrote:It amazing what a clean side Scotland can be when Dan Bigger isn't playing against them

T*sser.