nfe
Matt Scott. Well, Matthew, bloody media and their snappy names. He plays for Edinburgh Rugby in the PRO12s. Him and his brother have been playing Scotland A and U20s but he got pulled into the squad last week.
I've just discovered he has a wiki page and am outraged 

Nice one, hope he gets a chance to show what he can do on the international stage!
 

cenydd 

rew37 
France v Ireland called off minutes before kick-off due to a frozen pitch!!!!  Why in gods name was kick off scheduled at 2100, in February, at a stadium without under soil heating?  Someone at the IRB needs sacking. 

 
You never know - maybe someone somewhere will see sense and stop scheduling 6 nation games at stupid times in the evening! I doubt it, though! That was a farce - they should really have known days ago that the pitch just wasn't going to be playable, from the forecast (knowing the lack of facilities they have to stop it freezing when it's cold). 
I'm so glad we had the foresight to build a stadium with a roof! The pitch for tomorrow should be nice and warm and cosy, relatively speaking! 

 
It's disgraceful really, all those people travelled have been really seen off!  The IRB have some questions to answer about the scheduling because that should never have been allowed to happen.

rew37

France v Ireland called off minutes before kick-off due to a frozen pitch!!!!  Why in gods name was kick off scheduled at 2100, in February, at a stadium without under soil heating?  Someone at the IRB needs sacking.

 
That's a daft time to have a game during the winter isn't it? Can understand in summer, but in winter's a joke.
 
Hoping Bulls have kept their lead from half time.
 

rew37

It's disgraceful really, all those people travelled have been really seen off!  The IRB have some questions to answer about the scheduling because that should never have been allowed to happen.

It's not like we can blame Sky for these silly times either, as it's being shown on the BBC.
The least they could have done was move it to a ground which was playable - they had plenty of time, they were worried about the state of the pitch all week.

I notice that the French Rugby Federation are trying to blame the referee for the postponement, despite the fact that everyone knew what the weather would be like all week, the pitch was freezing at the end of the afternoon match last weekend, Vincent Clerc was warning about it on Tuesday and it's the middle of February and they've scheduled a 9pm kick off. It's a farce and apparently French TV were happy for the kick off time to be brought forward because of the weather. Why couldn't the match have been played at 1pm?
Ultimately the blame is with the TV companies and the six nations committee, including the FFR. The IRB have no jurisdiction wrt six nations scheduling.

You do need to blame the scheduling to some extent, but I find it ludicrous that the FFR/Stade de France couldn't sort the pitch out. It's understandable for smaller clubs with not much income, but it's not a small club and it has massive income.

Apparently French TV asked to bring kick off forward to 1400 as they were concerned about the pitch freezing, but the 6N Committee refused. 

Looks like the match has been rescheduled for Sunday 4th March. Don't see why they couldn't have rescheduled for last Sunday afternoon as at least there's a fair chance that the supporters would have still been in town to watch it. C'est la vie.

Shame for the supporters who can't make it to the rescheduled date. Least it's at a more appropriate time.

Im thinking the big game this week is going to be leeds vs manly for the world club challenge.

TEK34

You do need to blame the scheduling to some extent, but I find it ludicrous that the FFR/Stade de France couldn't sort the pitch out. It's understandable for smaller clubs with not much income, but it's not a small club and it has massive income.

Apparently the pitch did start to thaw, but then as the late kick off approached it began to freeze again.
 
Undersoil heating is one facility they cannot install at the stadium - apparently it's built on the site of an old chemical works (agricultural stuff I believe, fertilizers and such). Undersoil heating could cause the whole place to blow up.

haiggy

Im thinking the big game this week is going to be leeds vs manly for the world club challenge.

Where's it been played this year?

yorkshirerocker

haiggy
Im thinking the big game this week is going to be leeds vs manly for the world club challenge.

Where's it been played this year?

It's at Headingly tonight.

Would have liked to watch the game, but don't have sky sports anymore and couldn't be bothered going to pub by myself to watch it. It's one of the rare times I want Rhino's to win
 
Bulls have got Wigan this weekend, so no doubt that'll be 2nd loss of the season for us.

A kid I know from rugby's just been chosen for the England A U16s. Almost as good as other club mates like Courtney Lawes, Steve Thompson and Ben Cohen...

Nice.
 
Well Bulls v Wigan game was a waste of time. Mixture of Bulls putting in a terrible performance and Wigan playing well. Got hammered 54-16.

yorkshirerocker

Nice.

Well Bulls v Wigan game was a waste of time. Mixture of Bulls putting in a terrible performance and Wigan playing well. Got hammered 54-16.

Looks like another great win for the cherry and whites. Gelling hasn’t started playing yet, which is a bit of a worry. 
 
Hull KR Vs St Helens looked like a hell of a game

 Saw the odd highlight earlier and looked a good game.
 
After his performance against Bulls, Pat Richards is now the 3rd highest point scorer in Wigans history.
 
Is Magic weekend in Manchester this year?

Gethin Jenkins becomes the latest high profile Welsh player to leave Wales for France http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/17110717
I can't see how any of the Welsh regions are ever going to win a Heineken Cup with the way things are going. Surely it will only be a matter of time before the likes of Goerge North, Jamie Roberts, Sam Warburton etc move abroad aswell 

Rockstar
Gethin Jenkins becomes the latest high profile Welsh player to leave Wales for France http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/17110717
I can't see how any of the Welsh regions are ever going to win a Heineken Cup with the way things are going. Surely it will only be a matter of time before the likes of Goerge North, Jamie Roberts, Sam Warburton etc move abroad aswell 

The whole debate about the future of the regions that's been going on is a real worry, with the WRU talking of 'downgrading' one or more to 'development status'. I'm sure I'm not the only one that thinks they are trying to run the whole thing entirely in favour of Cardiff RFC, as usual! What they need to do is get some professional rugby north of the M4 - it was never realistic to expect people to come from somewhere like Pontypridd to come down and support the Blues, for example (especially when club tickets are under usually £10 per game, and regional tickets over £20). The financail/ticket sales issue they have been pointing to as justification is quite a simple one, as far as I'm concerned - the regions have priced themselves out of the market. £20+ is just too expensive for most people to be able to go regularly, especially in the current economic climate, and they might well make more profit from selling tickets cheaper, and being able to sell them in far greater numbers.

I heard some bloke from Cardiff Blues talking about moving the odd game to Sardis Road last Friday! That should satisfy the rest of the 'region'! Regional rugby is a mess. The WRU (and the Welsh rugby supporting public) will rue the day they wound up the Celtic Warriors prematurely.