Slam dunk for Dragons
15 Mar 2008
Wales clinched their second Six Nations Grand Slam in four years when they beat France 29-12 in Cardiff.
Five months ago, Welsh rugby was in crisis. They had failed to progress past the pool stage of the World Cup after losing to Fiji, and coach Gareth Jenkins was shown the door. Almost miraculously, New Zealander Warren Gatland has turned that sad side into Six Nations champions and one that can seriously challenge the Boks in June.
This was a tension-filled Test, as you’d expect from a tournament decider. With France having to win by at least 20 points to claim the Six Nations title on points difference, everyone expected them to throw caution to the wind. Yet Le Bleu never broke lose, and actually played quite conservatively for the majority of the game.
Wales had 70% of the territory in the first quarter and deserved to lead 9-3 after three penalties from flyhalf James Hook (he also missed one). In contrast, France No 10 David Skrela made a nervous start, having a kick charged down and slicing one off the side of his boot.
While France coach Marc Lievremont picked his best XV for this match, his experimental selection policy for the tournament meant this team had never played together. And it showed. France only began to show some continuity in the final 10 minutes of the half, and the pressure paid off in injury time when Wales centre Gavin Henson was sin-binned for a high tackle. France scrumhalf Jean-Baptiste Elissalde kicked his second penalty to make it 9-6 at the break.
But the visitors started the second half poorly, with wing Vincent Clerc trying to run the ball out of his 22, and a couple of crazy passes resulting in another penalty attempt for Hook. Luckily for Clerc and co, the flyhalf’s attempt went wide and two minutes later, Elissalde levelled the scores with his third penalty.
As the match entered the final quarter, Wales were struggling to get their hands on the ball. But the French knocked on in midfield, and Shane Williams hacked the ball ahead. The Welsh winger took off past the two chasing defenders and scored his 41st Test try – the most by a Welshman – under the posts. Stephen Jones – on for Hook – kicked the conversion and added a penalty a few minutes later to give his side a 19-9 lead.
With 15 minutes to go, France had a scrum 10m out from the Welsh line. Had they scored a try then, it was game on, but the home forwards shoved their opponents off the ball to claim the tighthead.
A penalty from replacement scrumhalf Dimitri Yachvili reduced the gap to seven, only for Jones to kick his second penalty. Wales wing Mark Jones then set off on a thrilling 60m run that saw him dart past half a dozen defenders before being brought to ground 2m out from the French tryline. A minute later, flank Martyn Williams sealed the victory with his side’s second try.
Wales – Tries: Shane Williams, Martyn Williams. Conversions: Stephen Jones (2). Penalties: James Hook (3), Jones (2).
France – Penalties: Jean-Baptiste Elissalde (3), Dimitri Yachvili.
By Simon Borchardt
390 Comments
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16 Mar 2008, 13:20 pm
And here is a news clipping from China :
Wife burns husband alive ‘for not washing feet’
A Chinese bride burnt her new husband to death after he got into bed after a drunken argument without washing his feet, state media has reported. “Wang and his wife, Luo, were married on February 2. The couple, however, frequently fought over trivial things while still on their honeymoon,” the official Xinhua news agency quoted a local newspaper as saying. The couple, from the central province of Hubei, had another fight on the night of March 4, “and in frustration they together drank a bottle of liquor to ease their anger”. “At about 10 pm, Luo watched her husband get into bed without cleaning or washing his feet. In a fit of anger and intoxication, she set fire to the sheet he was sleeping in,” the report said. “When he awoke, the two began fighting before a very drunk Wang collapsed. As fire engulfed the bedroom. Luo escaped to the living room, leaving her other half to burn,” it added. The woman has been arrested, Xinhua said.
Thursday Mar 13 06:43 AEDT
I bet men all over Hubei Province are washing their feet tonight !
16 Mar 2008, 13:21 pm
#350
Bwaaaaahahahahaha
16 Mar 2008, 13:29 pm
RP,
Yes, Old Slick Willie…… he has a certain charisma, I hope Mrs Clinton does well.
I have always favoured Democrats over Republicans.
Bush’s..vs… Kennedy’s.
Reagan ….vs …Clinton.
No Competition really is it.
16 Mar 2008, 13:38 pm
K9 So glad I could amuse
Cane
I thought Ronnie was an extraordinary man – probably one of the last great men in US politics.
You are talking to the wrong girl then … Also, I have a photo of RR in the oval office personally inscribed with birthday wishes
16 Mar 2008, 13:46 pm
Princess,
Surely a mere photo opportunity with a Right Wing Arsehole such as Ronnie would not sway one so obviously intelligent as yourself.
It would sway me…….but I’m unprincipled, impressionable and shallow.
Ronnie had the same characteristics as myself..
16 Mar 2008, 13:59 pm
Sjhoe ou Skops. Such rantings on an SA Sunday morning. You must check on the quality of that **** you stick up your snout or pour down your muzzle. It’s making you mal. Surely you can get SABS approved dope in your neck of the woods by now. Or did you get bit by the hydrophoby skunk? Foaming at da mouf an all are we? I thought I caught a normally level headed and eminently sensible fellow like you squealing about the ref in Sharks Lions game – tut. tut, most unusual and not at all good form for a future World Cup whining coach.
Also I’m really surprised your talent hasn’t been snapped up by an SA S14 team. Your great pal Jake ain’t coaching so a World Cup whiner like yourself should be in demand. Man, how you could help the Bulle. Of course you’d kick out Jake’s overrated pansies like Bakkies, FdP, WO, Danie R etc but maybe your granny could push at lock, nip out to pick up and distribute the ball brilliantly at scrummie then be in place to take the pass at centre, stepping off either foot to bamboozle the opposition and dot down under the posts. And it would cut their wage bill. She just mustn’t get a yellow ‘cause then there’d be kak. Don’t let her hang around with that fellow who’s always sticking his arm out like a traffic cop – it’ll come to me.
But maybe the Stormers have already taken up your services and that’s why they’ve improved so. I knew it, the Bulls have been pipped at the post for your esteemed services. But wait, there’s hope, Rasssie is still persisting in that well known (to you anyway) mal hoender Burger and JdV as kapitan instead of the outstanding Look, so maybe you’re still available.
Obviously the Sharks aren’t taking your advice as they’re struggling along unbeaten with useless lighties like Frans Steyn, JP Peterson and one R Pienaar who the great Skoppie would have insisted go smartly back to the U16’s to try out for the D team.
Obviously he’s not advising the Cheaters as then they would have offered a stern test to the Crusaders (albeit coached by one of Skoppie’s heroes – funny being a great general in a country when you admire the enemy’s leaders so much).
Could be he’s giving the Lions the benefit of his prodigious and unique rugby knowledge and it’s the naughty refs (and the opposition teams) who insist on beating them and so hiding the full benefit of S Kop’s unparalleled wisdom in all things rugby (and everything else) related.
On da udder hann as ou Naas Boater would say, maybe national treasure that he is Skops the oracle is to mentor Peter de V at the Jumping Bucks. Ah, so obviously PdeV’s comments about that bloated slug J Smit (who’s currently having a flash in the pan by playing rather well in France) captaining the ‘Bucks is a cunning deception. This is to lull the Welshies et al into a sense of false security which will be rudely shattered when they face the SA team led by a man nurtured and groomed by that rugby genius S Koppie (or his real name R Sole). This alone will make the team coached by Skoppie’s current heroine one W Gateland tremble and shiver, bowing in meek submission to the one and only Skopkatskiet. The SA team will then zoom to the next WC (Water Closet) unbeaten, in fact beating every team it meets by 49-0 or more as a tribute to R Sole’s coaching genius.
Of course Super Skop may actually have a key job, Minister of Space Travel or Electricity or something and be unable to offer any meaningful time to any team but tears himself away from his work of national importance to drip a few pearls down to us mere mortals on keo.
Crikey smoking the peace pipe and sipping vodak at midday makes me ramble and I must have dozed off.
16 Mar 2008, 13:59 pm
Cane
I was not there, it was arranged by a friend who worked for him. I loved Ronnie … Here are some of his great one liners :
Ronald Reagan lines
The taxpayer – that’s someone who works for the federal government but doesn’t have to take a civil-service exam.
Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
Millions of individuals making their own decisions in the marketplace will always allocate resources better than any centralized government planning process.
How do you tell a communist? Well, it’s someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-communist? It’s someone who understands Marx and Lenin.
Welfare’s purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence.
The size of the federal budget is not an appropriate barometer of social conscience or charitable concern.
My fellow Americans, I am pleased to tell you I just signed legislation which outlaws Russia forever. The bombing begins in five minutes. (Said during a radio microphone test, 1984)
We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we may always be free. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them — this morning, as they prepared for their journey, and waved good-bye, and “slipped the surly bonds of earth” to “touch the face of God. (Speech about the Challenger disaster).
The years ahead will be great ones for our country, for the cause of freedom and the spread of civilization. The West will not contain Communism, it will transcend Communism. We will not bother to denounce it, we’ll dismiss it as a sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages are even now being written.
The best social program is a productive job for anyone who’s willing to work.
Excellence demands competition. Without a race there can be no champion, no records broken, no excellence–in education or in any other walk of life.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.
The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”
I hope we have once again reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: as government expands, liberty contracts.
I hope you’re all Republicans. (to surgeons as he entered the operating room following his assassination attempt)
Our friends in the other party will never forgive us for our success, and are doing everything in their power to rewrite history. Listening to the liberals, you’d think that the 1980s were the worst period since the Great Depression, filled with suffering and despair. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting awfully tired of the whining voices from the White House these days. They’re claiming there was a decade of greed and neglect, but you and I know better than that. We were there.
16 Mar 2008, 14:01 pm
Cane is one of the very few bloggers on here with unreserved characteristics of open minded integrity, pity there are not more of his ilk around, one has got to meander through the sodden minefields of bloated egotistical numb skulls to arrive at some wholesome assessment of reasonable integrity.
Pity the numb skulls outnumber the open minded ten to a dozen, but its almost worth having to wade through all the soggy trash just to now and then find at least one decent mind of intelligent equilibrium.
16 Mar 2008, 14:03 pm
More quotes from Ronnie :
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done — Ronald Reagan
The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or the next. It was the deep knowledge — and pray to God we have not lost it — that there is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest — Ronald Reagan
Regimes planted by bayonets do not take root — Ronald Reagan
They say the world has become too complex for simple answers. They are wrong. There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right. Winston Churchill said that “the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits — not animals.” And he said, “There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty — Ronald Reagan
I have seen the rise and fall of Nazi tyranny, the subsequent cold war and the nuclear nightmare that for fifty years haunted the dreams of children everywhere. During that time my generation defeated totalitarianism. As a result, your world is poised for better tomorrows. What will you do on your journey? — Ronald Reagan
I hope that when you’re my age you’ll be able to say, as I have : we lived in freedom, we lived lives that were a statement, not an apology — Ronald Reagan
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free — Ronald Reagan
16 Mar 2008, 14:04 pm
Evening Skoppie
Why so mournful & down on so many this evening ?
16 Mar 2008, 14:07 pm
As for this fellow husky, I suggest he goes back to pulling sledges, yap yap yapping away across the frozen tundra, seems thats where his snout is pointed for now at least anyway.
16 Mar 2008, 14:12 pm
Midday here Princess, its the keological brains trust who are reputably dodgy in their assessment of all things square, like pegs that won’t fit into holes or pigeons that simply cant roost in either boxes or doooooses.
So they are intent on getting their snotty noses rubbed in it time and time and time again, what can we do? simply nothing at all.
16 Mar 2008, 14:14 pm
299
Cipriani is better than Carter and Evans already.
With Danny at 10 and Wilko at 12 I see another World Cup coming home in 2011
16 Mar 2008, 14:16 pm
Wales, Wales, Wales
16 Mar 2008, 14:18 pm
Skoppie
Why so grumpy ? That is not the usual cheerful chap I know. How is business hon ?
Biggles
Oohh come on … Best you ask nursey to up your meds, there’s a good boy
16 Mar 2008, 14:19 pm
Evenign Chch
16 Mar 2008, 14:20 pm
365
You know its true RP. Definitely have a better chance than NZ anyway, we all know what they do come World Cup time.
We should’ve hammered Wales but we lost 5 players to injury in-game.
16 Mar 2008, 14:26 pm
Biggles
Coulda, woulda, sholda …
If you are going to quote “results only” at me when spitting your venom at my ABs best you apply the same policy with equal rigour to you bunch of WGBs
16 Mar 2008, 14:31 pm
368
I think 5 injuries in game is pretty significant don’t you?
must be some kind of record.
16 Mar 2008, 14:38 pm
Biggles
Displays an appalling lack of fitness actually.
16 Mar 2008, 14:39 pm
366 RP,
Good evening. Excited as I am off to watch the Crusaders play the Worrytahs this weekend
16 Mar 2008, 14:40 pm
Princess,
What has happened to the Blues?
They better not end up playing their semi-final in Christchurch
16 Mar 2008, 14:43 pm
370
lol, they were all fully fit when the match started. It was just appalling luck.
Wales wouldn’t have won if it wasn’t for the injuries as they were 19-6 down.
16 Mar 2008, 14:45 pm
Chch
Ssiigghh … Would love to see the Crus deliver another cricket score
Blues were just atrocious … One could be mistaken for thinking they were audtioning for Biggles.
How long are you in Sydney for ?
16 Mar 2008, 14:46 pm
2 more days (making 5 in total) … then on to Christchurch
16 Mar 2008, 14:49 pm
Biggles
Come on now – even Poms are not that “unlucky”
16 Mar 2008, 15:15 pm
Here are the Super 12/14 tops teams through history after 12 years
Winners
Crusaders: 6 wins – 8 finals – 9 semi-finals
Blues: 3 wins – 4 finals – 5 semi-finals
Brumbies: 2 wins – 5 finals – 6 semi-finals
Bulls: 1 win – 1 final – 4 semi-finals
Finalists
Sharks: 3 finals – 5 semi-finals
Highlanders: 1 final – 4 semi-finals
Hurricanes: 1 final – 4 semi-finals
Warratahs: 1 final – 3 semi-finals
Reds: 3 semi-finals
Stormers: 2 semi-finals
Cats: 2 semi-finals
Chiefs: 1 semi-final
The Lions and Cats as separate sides have yet to make a semi-final. The Force are also yet to make a semi final.
NZ: 9 wins – 14 finals – 23 semi-finals (5 teams)
Aus: 2 wins – 6 finals – 12 semi-finals (4 teams)
SA: 1 win – 4 finals – 13 semi-finals (5 teams)
NZ teams make up 48% of all semi-final spots and 58% of all final spots.
SA is rapidly catching up to the Aus statistics.
16 Mar 2008, 15:18 pm
Safe travels till you get home
16 Mar 2008, 15:19 pm
378 cheers RP
16 Mar 2008, 15:21 pm
377 sorry … ‘Lions and Cats’ should say ‘Lions and Cheetahs’
16 Mar 2008, 15:24 pm
Interesting stat that the Crusaders, Blues and Brumbies have each only lost one semi final
16 Mar 2008, 17:05 pm
377 chch
You are leaving out the Super 10 results, which is where the competition started, and which go back to 1993.
Year Winner Runner up
1993 Transvaal Auckland
1994 Queensland Natal
1995 Queensland Transvaal
Therefore…
NZ: 9 wins – 15 finals
Aus: 4 wins – 8 finals
SA: 2 wins – 7 finals
16 Mar 2008, 17:11 pm
Like I said on the other thread Stavros:
It’s gonna take while to top that log but hopefully we can pass the wooden spoon to the aussies in 2/3 seasons.
Does anyone know if Bakkies is gonna be cited after that atrocious game?
16 Mar 2008, 20:19 pm
SA 2 WC’s
Aust 2 WC’s
Eng 1 WC
NZ 1 WC (Where SA never played)
16 Mar 2008, 21:40 pm
#384
And lets do the Why SA didnt play there shall we?
:-0
Yeah lets not go down that dark path shall we
16 Mar 2008, 21:48 pm
Skopskiet = Mike Stofile
16 Mar 2008, 22:25 pm
#237
Sorry but Kahui is a huge walking sicknote.He is a good player but i would prefer to see Smith in centre and of course Nonu in there for impact,ok i do support Hurricanes so take what you like out of that.
16 Mar 2008, 22:52 pm
#385 Not the players fault??
17 Mar 2008, 05:11 am
# 384
Does not mean the kiwi’s didn’t deserve their win. They won didn’t they? And that’s the point. So what if SA weren’t there.
17 Mar 2008, 07:02 am
#384 Sure we won one and happy for that I might add. Are you trying to say that because the Boks werent present was the only reason the AB’s won. If you are you are contradicting yourself before you finish- by my count you attended five in total so if your so good what happened to other three I might ask? We were both there, what happened to you- we lost.
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