Who’s hot and who’s not!

Adam Kyriacou

It’s time for our Monday wrap of who has their name in lights and who is making the headlines for all the wrong reasons over the past week.

THEY’RE ON FIRE!

Wales: Pre-game many struggled to pick a winner between Wales and Scotland as it seemed little would separate them. How wrong we all were. Wales were outstanding as they brushed aside the Scots 34-7 at the Principality Stadium, with Gareth Davies, Leigh Halfpenny (2) and Steff Evans scoring their tries. Defensively too they were excellent as they shut down their visitors, who were expected to threaten throughout.

Johnny Sexton: That was pretty special wasn’t it? Even head coach Joe Schmidt thought the game was gone in Paris with almost 83 minutes on the clock. Trailing 13-12, 40-odd metres from the France line and with Sexton down with an injury, it looked to be all over for the Irish. But then the fly-half shook off his knock and took a shot from 44 metres out, watching as a sweetly struck drop-goal went over. Incredible.

Uruguay: The champagne was also flowing in Montevideo as Uruguay booked their place in the Rugby World Cup, beating Canada in back-to-back fixtures. This win saw the South Americans prevail 32-31, thus claiming a 70-60 aggregate triumph. What a moment for the players and fans.

Fiji Sevens: The Pacific islanders were in fine form as they were crowned champions at the inaugural Hamilton Sevens over the weekend. This was Fiji’s first victory on the World Rugby Seven Series and they did it in style in the final as they came back from a 5-17 half-time deficit to claim a 24-17 win over series leaders South Africa. Special praise goes to Fiji’s Alosio Naduva who walked off with the Player of the Final award after scoring a hat-trick of tries.

Sam Simmonds: The Exeter Chiefs number eight capped a superb performance by scoring two tries in his Six Nations debut for England against Italy in Rome. That is some feat as it was the first time an England forward scored a brace in the Six Nations since James Haskell in 2010. Simmonds made full use of his opportunity in England’s run-on side after a fine all-round showing, in which he shone on defence and attack, and was unlucky to lose out to team-mate Anthony Watson for the Man-of-the-Match award.

COLD AS ICE!

Les Kiss: It seemed inevitable that Kiss would, at some point, depart his post at Ulster. On and off the field it’s been a difficult year for the province and on Wednesday it was announced that Kiss and Ulster would part ways. Head coach Jono Gibbes has assumed responsibility for all coaching matters and will lead the current coaching team of Dwayne Peel, Aaron Dundon and Niall Malone. Ulster will hope it works.

HIA debacle: This doesn’t look good for France, who are under investigation after half-backs Matthieu Jalibert and Antoine Dupont came off with what appeared to be knee injuries but both were also registered as requiring head injury assessments. Six Nations organisers are now investigating France’s use of HIA protocols, with replays appearing to question the matchday doctor’s calls. It left many pundits fuming.

Scotland: That was as bad a day at the office we’ve seen from Scotland in a good while. As mentioned, they were a good shout to prevail in Cardiff before kick-off, but were outgunned and outplayed by their Welsh hosts. Errors galore hindered Scotland’s performance and they now need to regroup and recapture that November form when they face France at Murrayfield next weekend. Their fans will hope for a backlash.

Canada: Already outside the top 20 in the World Rugby Rankings, Canada suffered a further setback on Saturday with that defeat to Uruguay. They can still qualify for the Rugby World Cup but must now go into the repechage tournament, which will feature four teams playing in a round-robin format with the winners qualifying for RWC 2019. Kingsley Jones and his troops simply have to pick themselves up and go again.

Allister Coetzee: Speaking of coaching casualties, this one has dragged on and on. Coetzee and SA Rugby agreed to terminate their working relationship after a two-year association, as Coetzee ultimately found himself falling on the axe after a disappointing tenure in charge.