Saturday, 6 February 2010
Ireland v Italy, 14:30
England v Wales, 17:00

England and Wales clash at Twickenham this weekend in the tastiest Six Nations contest of the new decade, but the traditional rivals will be playing to a packed house due to the stadium’s 100th anniversary. The pageantry involved will crank up the pressure in a match which both sides will believe they can win, but England look a decent wager at just 4-6 to see off their beleaguered visitors.

According to the IRB, England are the superior side, and given that Martin Johnson enjoys the return of some of his most trusted lieutenants, it seems that the bookmakers have given punters a gilt-edged opportunity. Johnson welcomes back Riki Flutey, Delon Armitage and Nick Easter to the fray, and with that triumvirate in tow, England finished second in last season's standings. Johnson’s men also scored the most tries, and the cumulative winning margin that they lost away to Ireland and Wales was just nine points. England’s tortuous autumn was largely down to the fact that Johnson was missing these three, along with several others, and with a bolstered squad England should simply be too good for the Welsh at 4-6.

Punters who like to bet at odds against have a range of possibilities, but as highlighted in the tournament preview, Wales are one of the many teams who have struggled to plug the centre channel in defence. Under their coach Warren Gatland, Wales have conceded a try in 18 matches. In ten of those games, the first try was scored by a centre, and in all centres have scored 13 of the 35 tries that Wales have conceded under the Kiwi. Flutey returns to the centre to partner Matthew Tait and although Tait also knows the way to the whitewash, Flutey has a better tryscoring ratio and is 8-1 with Paddy Power to be England’s first tryscorer or 4-1 with Coral simply to cross the tryline.

Italy try to remain competitive against Ireland in Dublin without their talisman and skipper Sergio Parisse. The Stade Francais No.8 misses the tournament with a cruciate injury and will be sorely missed by the Azzurri. Italy will be travelling to Croke Park with optimism having lost by four and five points respectively in their last two visits to Dublin, and with a 21.5-point start by the bookmakers there will be many out there who will fancy Nick Mallett’s visitors. The trouble with Italy is that in recent times they have conceded a hatful of points in the first half, which means the contest is over, as far as the result is concerned, by half-time. What is interesting to note, however, is that Mallett’s men do not lie down. Faced with an avalanche of points to make up, Italy hang on in there, and in fact they concede on average more points in the first half than they do on the second under their South African coach. Ladbrokes offer a second-half handicap of 11 points, which is bigger than all of the available handicaps for the first half. It looks a mistake, and punters should latch on to this quick smart.

Finally, the best of the weekend lies in Sunday's showdown between Scotland and France at Murrayfield. Ever since the Scots edged out Australia 9-8 in the autumn, punters north of the border have been dreaming about Six Nations success. First up are the French, who were thoroughly dismantled by the All Blacks in their final game of the November internationals. What’s more, coach Marc Lievremont hasn’t had the best preparation with his players due to the vagaries of the Top 14 fixture list. The former France great has also culled the side that lost so badly to the All Blacks, making ten changes to his run-on team. What this adds up to is that Scotland will be the better prepared and are likely to draw first blood. Back them to score the first points of the match at 11-10. They have done so at Murrayfield in 11 of their last 13 encounters there.

BetRepublic Betting Recommendations (1-5pt staking plan):

England v Wales:
1pt England to win at 4-6 v Wales
1pt R Flutey to score a try at 4-1 (Coral)

Ireland v Italy:
1pt Italy +11 on second-half handicap at 10-11 (Ladbrokes)

Scotland v France:
3pts Scotland to score first at 11-10 (general)

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