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Italy's O'Shea gives his verdict on potential Six Nations format change
By Online Editors
Conor O'Shea would welcome the introduction of promotion and relegation into the Guinness Six Nations even though it would threaten Italy's Championship future.
Georgia are pushing hard for inclusion among Europe's elite with the Azzurri the most likely side to face them if a play-off against the side finishing top of the second tier was introduced.
That prospect remains unlikely with the Six Nations a commercially driven competition controlled by the unions involved, but O'Shea would accept it as a means to enhance the global game.
"Just tell us the rules and we'll play it and make sure the game grows," Italy's head coach said.
"It's about what's good for the game. With what we're doing in Italy I'd be quite comfortable that. Whether it's me here or someone else here, we have a bloody good team in the making.
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"We want to make some memories in the short term, but I know this group is going to be together for quite some time.
"We play for the future of Italian rugby every day we go out on the pitch. We play to win now, but we're also playing for the future."
O'Shea also embraces the idea of the Nations Championship - World Rugby's annual competition devised to improve the number of quality teams competing in the global arena.
"On the face of it this seems like a really exciting proposal. The one thing we need to do is to grow the game," O'Shea said.
"If we just have the couple of rich kids winning everything then we don't have a game. That's at club level and international level.
"The Italian job is not about me, it's about making Italy a competitive force again like it was and it will be. It should be the same for Georgia, Romania, Fiji, Canada.
"They are protecting Lions years, they are protecting World Cup year. It sounds all right."
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Skelton may be brought back for the Wallabies so that would be the only reason that may hinder Wilson. Easily the form, most skilful and game IQ of any Oz 8. Valentini’s best and favourite position is 6, but lineouts may be an issue with Skelton, Valentini and Wilson. Will be interesting what Schmidt goes for but for me Wilson should be picked on form. Schmidt rewards work rate, skill and consistency. All that glitters every so often won’t be in contention. Greely is one of those players that has a knack of making the right decision. A coach is going to love him because he knows week in week out he’s going to get the job done. The second try Greely wasn’t the guy who made the initial break it was Flook, Greely was at the bottom of the ruck when Flook was off along the sideline. Greely got up and made the effort to catch up with play but also read the play nicely and hit the pass from Campbell at pace and then held the pass beautifully to Ryan.
Go to commentsSharks deserved to be far further back by the last quarter. Their tackling was awful, their set pieces were disappointing, their defensive organization was poor (especially on the Kok side of the D line), they kept making unnecessary errors, and they never looked like cracking the Clermont defense during those first 60m. Masuku kept them in touch, with some help from the Clermont generosity on penalty opportunities. Agree with the writer of this article. It was belligerence, and ability to raise their pressure game just enough, that turned the last quarter into a Bok-style shutout. Clermont have a reputation of not playing the full 80m, and there was a bit of that for sure. But, quite often when the intensity of a team drops off in the last quarter credit is due to the opponent for tiring them out. At 60m, with the Kok try, you thought that just maybe the game was on. At 70m, with the Mapimpi contribution, one felt that Clermont were fading, while facing a team that would maintain the pressure game through the final whistle. Good win in the end, but the Sharks are still playing way below their potential. And with their resources, and a coach that has had enough time to figure things out, they are running out of excuses.
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