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[2025 Six Nations] England vs Italy - 9/3/25

My take is that England's deficiencies in attack and seeming lack of ambition to play will keep Italy in the game for a long time - and if Italy can nail 2 or 3 breaks and chances that they will create because of their attacking structure, I think they've got the ability to run England very close. England under Borthwick are set up to grind out wins and bring better teams down to our level, we are not set up to absolutely blitz inferior teams. I feel like the main priority is still to stop other teams playing.
I agree. SB is strangling the team. Itoje will likely need to stage a coup on the day and give the lads free reign to play. If not I have similar concerns to you. And this is the frustration, because if SB did allow the lads to play their own brand of rugby we may see some real progress.
 
That's utterly spurious, dismissive tripe. Menoncello, Brex, Capuozzo, Ioane would walk into England's team and Garbisi wouldn't be a million miles off either. You need a reality check mate, this team is nowhere near as good as you think it is and a couple of lucky one point wins don't change that. We've got the better pack, but when was the last time we really dominated somebody at the scrum and won a game off it, it's years ago. Our scrum is overrated.
Menoncello and Brex as a partnership, yes and Capuozzo (only at 15 though). Can’t agree on Ioane though. He’d be in contention but ‘walk in’? Personally, I think Garbisi is overrated and behind both Smiths and Ford.

Our scrum is overrated but has looked decent against Ireland and France which isn’t insignificant.

I don’t expect Italy to win but I don’t think it’ll be anything like the France result.
 
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Italy’s team for the game. Capuozzo at full-back. Finally sanity prevails. Interesting change at 9 and Vintcent is starting at number 8.
 
Menoncello and Brex as a partnership, yes and Capuozzo (only at 15 though). Can't agree on Ioane though. He'd be in contention but 'walk in'? Personally, I think Garbisi is overrated and behind both Smiths and Ford.

Our scrum is overrated but has looked decent against Ireland and France which isn't insignificant.

I don't expect Italy to win but I don't think it'll be anything like the France result.
Interesting take on Garbisi, he used to be picked ahead of Pollard at Montpellier
 
Tbf he has been given no service and strengths aren't chasing box kicks. Play Roebuck if that is the intention.
It really gets me that a young inexperienced player only has to make a few errors and they are deemed unworthy and terrible in the England setup, many teams build continuity and allow players to improve and flourish. I too would like to see Roebuck, however neither him or Freeman possess express pace, I wonder if that’s part of it and trying to balance things.
 
Interesting take on Garbisi, he used to be picked ahead of Pollard at Montpellier

Montpellier are a bit of a basket case club. IIRC, they were also playing Lozowski at 10 quite a bit. Who they pick doesn’t count for that much IMO.

I rate Garbisi but I don’t think he is better than/I wouldn’t swap him for any of our current 10s.

He definitely wouldn’t ’walk in’ to our starting XV as @OllyM97 said.
 
It really gets me that a young inexperienced player only has to make a few errors and they are deemed unworthy and terrible in the England setup, many teams build continuity and allow players to improve and flourish. I too would like to see Roebuck, however neither him or Freeman possess express pace, I wonder if that's part of it and trying to balance things.
Exactly, OS hasn't been picked because he is the best nuts and bolts type winger. His game is X factor ball in hand hard running.
 
It really gets me that a young inexperienced player only has to make a few errors and they are deemed unworthy and terrible in the England setup, many teams build continuity and allow players to improve and flourish. I too would like to see Roebuck, however neither him or Freeman possess express pace, I wonder if that's part of it and trying to balance things.

All circles back to the players suiting the game plan. Jason Robinson would have looked a total spare part the way we played against Scotland.

No data to back it up, but I get the impression that our current wings remain out wide much more than many others. We seldom see them popping up on the other wing or in midfield trying to make things happen. Not sure if that’s by instinct or instruction, but that’s where IFW scores highly.
 
All circles back to the players suiting the game plan. Jason Robinson would have looked a total spare part the way we played against Scotland.

No data to back it up, but I get the impression that our current wings remain out wide much more than many others. We seldom see them popping up on the other wing or in midfield trying to make things happen. Not sure if that's by instinct or instruction, but that's where IFW scores highly.
That’s almost certainly system based (I’m sure a saints fan will tell me if I’m wrong) but I’m pretty sure Freeman pops up all over the place and actively hunts work.
 
That's almost certainly system based (I'm sure a saints fan will tell me if I'm wrong) but I'm pretty sure Freeman pops up all over the place and actively hunts work.
Saints fan here, while Freeman does pop up, we actually pass the ball into space at depth so we can use our backs. It doesn’t need to be about them looking for work of every one else is doing their job.

England on the other hand can’t get the ball from sh, fh to centres to wing. So while we can blame the wingers for not looking for work, I’d like our backs to actually do their jobs.
 

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