A decent start to the Six Nations for Ireland then, but how did your own charges fare in The Irish Times Fantasy Rugby League?
Irish rugby fans certainly aren’t going to complain about how the opening weekend of this year’s Six Nations panned out. With a solid and unspectacular victory over Scotland secured, England losing in the most dramatic of circumstances and Wales not looking particularly hot against Italy, it didn’t turn out too bad overall.
As far as Fantasy Rugby is concerned, there were plenty of points on offer if you played your cards right, especially if you included France’s Yoann Huget or Italy’s Michele Campagnaro in your team and even more especially if you included both of them.
Huget and Campagnaro scored two tries apiece and earned the man of the match awards for fine hauls of 18 points, five points clear of their nearest competitor, stand-in Irish captain Jamie Heaslip, who earned the man of the match gong and touched down for a try against the Scots yesterday.
Huget, Campagnaro, Heaslip and Rob Kearney (a try and assist for 11 points) were the only players to reach double figures after Week One, with a whole host of players managing eight points, including our own Andrew Trimble, Welsh duo Alex Cuthbert and Scott Williams and English trio Mike Brown, Luther Burrell and Billy Vunipola.
Leigh Halfpenny shaded the battle of the kickers with eight points to Jonathan Sexton’s seven (points for kickers only apply to the designated kicker, of course), while Conor Murray was the highest scoring scrum-half after recording an assist at the Aviva.
Jerry v Mal
The battle between JOE’s resident rugby experts is arse-clenchingly tight after Week One, with Mal narrowly resuming the stranglehold over his Munster rival that he held for the duration of last season’s competition.
Both Mal and Jerry benefitted from the inclusion of Leigh Halfpenny as kicker and assist machine Billy Vunipola in the forwards and while Jerry might have felt that having 18-point Yoann Huget in his team would have given him an edge, Mal’s selection of Alex Cuthbert and Jamie Heaslip was enough to give him a two-point lead after Week One.
Still, scores of 67 and 65 respectively are not to be scoffed at and far better than what they posted on the majority of weekends last season; the less said about that for Mal and Jerry’s sake, the better.
The JOE League
As one might expect in a league with hundreds of managers – we lost count of the exact figure in the end and must apologise to those of you not included in the league because you missed the deadline – the standard in the JOE League was of the highest quality on the opening weekend.
Barry Deacy’s DC United set the bar very high with a score of 90 points thanks to the contributions of Yoann Huget and Jamie Heaslip amongst others and that score was enough to open a seven-point gap ahead of Colin McDonagh’s ColysXV and Barry Dungan’s Intense Flavours in second.
Shane Houlihan’s excellently titled charges, the Rugger Bandits, are out on their own in third place, ahead of Conor McSweeney’s not so excellently titled Squeeny’s Totes Amazeballs, Colm Mulkerrin’s El Putto Madrey and Alan Noonan’s OodlesofNoodles in fourth.
Paul Monahan’s Eiffel Power and Paul Davis’ Craughwell Crusaders, meanwhile, are bringing up the rear in fifth place, although with ten teams within two points of those two lads, the chasing pack will be pushing hard for position next weekend.
The JOE League Top 5:
- DC United – Barry Deacy: 90 points
- ColysXV – Colin McDonagh, Intense Flavours – Barry Dungan: 83 points
- The Rugger Bandits – Shane Houlihan: 81 points
- Squeeny’s Totes Amazeballs XV – Conor McSweeney, El putto madrey – Colm Mulkerrin, OodlesofNoodles – Alan Noonan: 80 points
- Eiffel Power – Paul Monahan, Craughwell Crusaders – Paul Davis: 79 points
17. Mal’s Malitia – Malcolm O’Kelly: 67 points
19. Fla’s Fantastic Moist Makers – Jerry Flannery: 65 points
