Today's rugby news as Wales star 'absolutely devastated' by cruel incident and Italy coach stokes fire
These are your rugby headlines on the morning of Tuesday, February 4.
Watkin 'absolutely devastated'
Wales star Owen Watkin says he is "absolutely devastated" by the injury he sustained in Paris on Friday night.
Watkin suffered a serious knee injury in the first half of the defeat at Stade de France, with Warren Gatland admitting post-match that he and team-mate Aaron Wainwright didn't "look brilliant" after their respective knocks. Join WalesOnline Rugby's WhatsApp Channel here to get the breaking news sent straight to your phone for free
READ MORE: Jiffy column: It's clear where Wales went wrong, I don't get what the plan was
READ MORE: Wales press conference LIVE as hope remains for Faletau and Wainwright
"We have to get them assessed," he said. "They both don’t look brilliant at the moment.
"Owen’s in a brace with his knee so it looks like it could be an ACL and Aaron needs another head injury assessment. He’s got quite a nasty gash on his face, down through his lip."
Watkin, who despite the serious nature of his injury has remained in camp for further assessment, has now spoken on social media.
"Absolutely devastated with the injury," he wrote on Instagram. "It can be a cruel old game on times, but with every setback there’s a comeback. thank you for all the messages."
Quesada: This is the match everyone is waiting for
Italy head coach Gonzalo Quesada says the match between the Azzurri and Wales this weekend is "a match that everyone is waiting for".
Both sides lost their opening-round matches, with Wales pasted by France in Paris and Italy going down to defeat to Scotland in Edinburgh.
The fixture is already being dubbed the Wooden Spoon decider, with former England coach Sir Clive Woodward billing the home side as "firm favourites".
Quesada has now stoked the fires, with the Italians looking to replicate their victory in Cardiff last year.
“We need to continue spending time together, working harder, but we still came close to playing a great match,” he said after the Scotland defeat.
“It’s a defeat that hurts because we conceded a few easy points in the first match in situations that we are easily able to defend effectively, now we immediately start to concentrate on the match on Saturday in Rome against Wales, a very intense and demanding week awaits us, it’s a match that everyone is waiting for but the reality for us is that we will prepare for it in the best possible way, as we always prepare for all our matches.”
Wales boss targeting bounce back
Wales U20s head coach Richard Whiffin is hoping his side can bounce back after a 63-19 hammering at the hands of France.
'Les Bleuets' ran in nine tries against Wales after leading by only nine points at half time, with Wales having more tries on the board at that point.
“Coming in at half time we were happy with how we had played. The boys were frustrated that it had gone to 21-12 because we had left a few chances to score out there, but confident for the second half," explained Whiffin.
“We didn’t give up or fall off anything, but momentum got on top of us and we struggled to arrest it. Our front five in the first half were brilliant, the scrum was solid, we tested them at maul time and the back row were outstanding. Evan Minto’s collisions were impressive, Harry Beddall was constantly in shot and Deian Gwynne was a pest around the breakdown. The pack gave us a really good platform in the first half and we were dangerous when we did move the ball."
This week, Whiffin's outfit face Italy on Friday night at 7.15pm, and the boss has pin-pointed what needs to change if they are to win.
“We need to be more accurate in our kicking game and not become too loose. We probably coughed up possession too easily in the back line at times. Italy played well in their win in Scotland, they’ve got some good players and it is always difficult going to play away from home in the Six Nations. We will pick the bones out of this game then rest, recover and prepare for Round 2.
“We’ll learn a lot from in Vannes and from playing in an atmosphere like that. We need to get used to being in these environments and how to prepare to play in a bear pit.”
Dupont is human, says Freeman
By Duncan Bech, PA England Rugby Correspondent
Tommy Freeman insists England are confident of containing France’s scrum-half genius Antoine Dupont in Saturday’s Allianz Stadium showdown.
Dupont underlined his creative brilliance in Friday’s demolition of Wales to provide more compelling evidence to those who argue that he is the sport’s greatest player of all time.
England have been busy devising a strategy to prevent the Toulouse ringmaster from running the show in a must-win encounter and Freeman insists he is not invulnerable.
“You can’t underestimate how good a player he is, but he’s human. He’s like everyone else – you take his legs and he goes down,” the Northampton wing said.
“It’s all about picking things up nice and early with him and putting him under pressure.
“I’m sure like any other player, when you put pressure on them they start to leak a few opportunities.”
France set the Six Nations alight with their 43-0 Dupont-inspired drubbing of Wales and fears are growing that they are poised to inflict further misery on England.
A 27-22 defeat by Ireland on Saturday registered a record-equalling seventh successive defeat against top tier opposition for Steve Borthwick’s side. One more loss would represent a new low in the nation’s 154 rugby history.
On current form the Twickenham showdown is a mismatch, but Freeman is adamant that England can pull off the upset.
“Of course we can. At the end of the day everyone is human, it’s rugby,” Freeman said.
“They’ll have a gameplan, we’ll have a gameplan and we’ll back ours to the moon and back. They’ll do the same to theirs. We’ll give ours as best a shot as we can.
“Obviously we wanted to come away with a result against Ireland. We felt like our first half was unbelievable. We came out firing and left it all out there.
“There was probably an element in the second half where we lapsed in concentration and a few things didn’t go our way.
“We’re disappointed with that, but the promise we’ve got in this squad means it’s going to tick and it’s going to change. Hopefully we’ll get on the right side of the results.”
Cadan Murley has emerged as a doubt against France because of a foot problem sustained in Dublin that forced him to miss Monday’s training session.
The 25-year-old Harlequins wing made his Test debut at the Aviva Stadium and while he ran in the opening try, he was responsible for two glaring errors that invited pressure on to England, leaving him fighting for his place in the team.
Ollie Sleightholme is the most likely alternative to fill the number 11 jersey if Murley is ruled out as England look to give their Six Nations lift off by toppling France.