The RWU Expert Panel is comprised of Rugby Rain Man Junoir Blaber, England’s Jamie Loyd, American Brit Nick Hall, infamous Ireland National, Declan Yeats, Englishman-in-Castres, James Harrington and contrived Kiwi Co-Host, Johnathan Wicklow Barberie.
NEW YORK, NY – The penultimate round of the 2015 6 Nations was the round that changed the whole title race. The last round may have been chaos, but the results this weekend brought clarity. It is now a 3 horse race for the title. Trailing the pack, there’s a 3 way tie for third with the other 3 separated by 1 game. Let’s see how the experts fared in our 6 Nations Picks Review.
-The Wales versus Ireland was tough match to watch and it broke the Irish stranglehold on first place.
-The England v Scotland showed more fortitude than their hosts France in a match that had French fans and their coach voicing their frustrations. It split the panel.
The Ireland v England game was another one that split the panel. It was a huge clash and the split went down to each expert’s family ties.
Hall: 10-2, with the bonus of getting the Pick of the Week right and taking his Pick of the Week record to 1-3. Mr. Hall had the best week he has had as member of the expert panel. He finally snapped his pick of the week drought. He was also perfect on all his picks. He rooted against an Irish victory as all the Englishmen do and got what he wished. England won against Scotland and as many expected Italy were no match for France. The perfect week gave sole position of first place.
JWB: 9-2, with the bonus of getting the Pick of the Week right and taking his Pick of the Week record to 2-2. JWB’s Irish roots cost him a perfect week and a chance to keep pace with Mr. Hall. However, England and France still came through for the Kiwi. This leaves him one match out of it and with the Pick of the Week record, the tiebreaker as long as he maintains a superior one than Hall, he will carry the trophy.
Loyd: 9-3, with the bonus of getting the Pick of the Week wrong and taking his Pick of the Week record to 2-2. The Noble Englishman’s perfect streak is back with vengeance after last week’s winless weekend. He went perfect in his picks. Like his countryman, Hall, he wanted a Welsh win and got one. That and taking the somewhat easy road on the Pick of the Week put him back in the race and currently holding the tiebreaker.
Yeats: 6-6 with the shame of getting the Pick of the Week wrong and taking his Pick of the Week record to 3-1.Things appear to have gone back to normal. As Loyd went back to a great week, Yeats and his selection system went back to hurting him. He of course backed his Irish to go to Cardiff and win and we all know that didn’t go as planned. He, of course picked the Scots against the English and his Celtic brethren let him down. So Yeats now leads a three-way tie for third or last place, depending on how you look at it.
Harrington: 6-6, with the bonus of getting the Pick of the Week right and taking his Pick of the Week record to 3-1. The Castres-residing writing machine is trying to bounce back from a dreadful week. He was only denied a perfect week by the underwhelming Irish performance against Wales. His improved Pick of the Week record did lift him out the cellar though.
Blaber: 6-6, with the shame of getting the Pick of the Week wrong and taking his Pick of the Week record to 1-3. Mssr. Blaber can now be classified as out of it. he would need to get all of the final round picks correct, while Mr. Hall got them wrong and then also get the Pick of the Week correct while Hall also got that wrong. It is possible all of this can happen but the key will be is he mad or desperate enough to expect Wales to lose in the next round. It is doubtful therefore, it time to wait til next year. Or at least the European Champions Cup picks.
1 final round left to go. Almost each member of the RWU Panel technically has a chance to win it all, tune in next week to find out the winner.
That’s it for now. Feel free to comment below, look for and “Like” our Facebook Rugby Wrap Up Page and follow us on Twitter@: RugbyWrapUp, Junoir Blaber, James Harrington, Jamie Wall, Nick Hall, DJ Eberle, Jake Frechette, Scheenagh Harrington, Jamie Loyd, Cody Kuxmann, Karen Ritter and Declan Yeats, respectively.
And as always, stay low and keep pumping those legs.
