The 2017 Six Nations Championship was the 18th series of the
Six Nations Championship
The Six Nations Championship (known as the Guinness Six Nations for sponsorship reasons) is an annual international men's rugby union competition between the teams of England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales. The current champions ar ...
, the annual northern hemisphere
rugby union
Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...
championship. The tournament was also known as the RBS 6 Nations because of the tournament's sponsorship by
The Royal Bank of Scotland Group
NatWest Group plc is a British banking and insurance holding company, based in Edinburgh, Scotland. The group operates a wide variety of banking brands offering personal and business banking, private banking, investment banking, insurance and ...
.
It was contested by defending champions
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
,
Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
and
Wales
Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...
. Including the competition's previous iterations as the Home Nations Championship and Five Nations Championship, it was the 123rd edition of the tournament.
For the first time the 2017 tournament used the bonus point system common to most other professional rugby union tournaments.
As well as the standard four points for a win and two for a draw, a team scoring four tries in a match received an additional league table point, as did a team losing by seven or fewer points.
Additionally, to ensure that a team winning all of its five matches (a
Grand Slam) would also win the Championship, three bonus points were to be awarded for this achievement.
For the second successive year, the championship was won by England with a round to spare.
However, they were denied the Grand Slam and
Triple Crown in the final game by a defeat to Ireland in the final round, the fifth time this has happened to England in the Six Nations era (
2000
File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...
,
2001
The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...
,
2011
File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...
,
2013
File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fact ...
and 2017) and the third time at the hands of the Irish (the other two being
2001
The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...
and
2011
File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...
).
Participants
1 Except the round 2 match against Italy, when Best was a late withdrawal due to illness and
Jamie Heaslip
James Peter Richard Heaslip (born 15 December 1983) is an Irish rugby union former player who played for Leinster and Ireland. He played as a number 8. Heaslip earned 95 caps for Ireland during his international career from 2006 to 2017, makin ...
took over the captaincy.
2 Replaced original captain
Greig Laidlaw
Greig Laidlaw (born 12 October 1985) is a Scotland, Scottish professional rugby union player. He plays as a Scrum-half (rugby union), scrum-half and as a Fly-half (rugby union), fly-half for NTT Communications Shining Arcs, Shining Arcs. Laidlaw ...
, who was ruled out of the Championship after sustaining an injury during Scotland's game against France in round 2.
Squads
Table
Fixtures
Round 1
Notes:
* Scotland reclaimed the
Centenary Quaich
The Centenary Quaich (; Scottish Gaelic: ''Cuach nan Ceud Bliadhna''; Irish: ''Corn na Céad Bliain'') is an international rugby union award contested annually by Ireland and Scotland as part of the Six Nations Championship.
A "Quaich" is a Gae ...
for the first time since 2013, the last time they beat Ireland.
* Scotland won their opening Six Nations match for the first time since 2006.
* Ireland lost their opening Six Nations match for the first time since 2012.
* Stuart Hogg became Scotland's highest try scorer in the Six Nations.
* Ireland received the first bonus point in the history of the Six Nations.
----
Notes:
*
Arthur Iturria (France) made his international debut.
* England won their 15th consecutive match, their longest winning run.
----
Round 2
Notes:
*
Niall Scannell
Niall Scannell (born 8 April 1992) is an Irish people, Irish rugby union player for Munster Rugby, Munster in the United Rugby Championship and European Rugby Champions Cup. He plays as a Rugby union positions#Hooker, hooker and represents Dolp ...
(Ireland) made his test debut.
* Ireland captain
Rory Best was named to start but was withdrawn from the team due to illness on the day of the match.
*
CJ Stander
Christiaan Johan Stander (born 5 April 1990) is a South African-Irish former rugby union player. Stander's career began in his native South Africa, where he played for the Blue Bulls in the Currie Cup between 2010 and 2012 and for the Bulls in ...
became the first forward to score a hat-trick in the Six Nations.
* Ireland earned the first try bonus point in the history of the Six Nations.
* This was Ireland's largest victory in the tournament.
----
Notes:
*
George North
George Philip North (born 13 April 1992) is a Welsh professional rugby union player who plays for the Ospreys in the United Rugby Championship and the Wales national team. He has also represented the British & Irish Lions and currently has th ...
was named to start for Wales but was replaced by
Alex Cuthbert
Alex Cuthbert (born 5 April 1990) is a Welsh rugby union player. Born in Gloucester, he plays on the wing for the Ospreys and the Wales national team.
Early life
Born in Gloucester, Cuthbert went to Newent Community School. He gained a diplom ...
after failing to recover from injury.
----
Notes:
*
Stuart Hogg
Stuart Hogg (born 24 June 1992) is a Scottish rugby union player who plays for Exeter Chiefs in the English Premiership and used to captain the Scottish national team. His playing positions are fullback and fly-half.
Hogg has twice been nam ...
(Scotland) earned his 50th test cap.
*
Simon Berghan
Simon Berghan (born 7 December 1990) is a former Scotland international rugby union player. A prop forward, he played for Glasgow Warriors in the United Rugby Championship, having previously played for Edinburgh Rugby in the Pro14. On 18 June 2 ...
(Scotland) made his international debut.
Round 3
Notes:
* Scotland ended a record nine-match losing streak against Wales by winning for the first time since their 21–9 victory in
2007
File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple's first iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakistani Prime Minister of Pakistan, Pr ...
.
* With this victory, Scotland climbed from seventh to fifth in the World Rugby Rankings, their highest position since the rankings were introduced in 2003, overtaking South Africa and Wales.
----
Notes:
*
Henry Chavancy
Henry Chavancy (born 22 May 1988 in Strasbourg) is a French rugby union player. He plays as a centre for Racing Métro in the Top 14.
Early life
He studied at lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague and lycée militaire de Saint-Cyr after 2 years at the ...
(France) made his international debut.
----
Notes:
*
Leonardo Ghiraldini
Leonardo Ghiraldini (born 26 December 1984) is a retired Italian international rugby union player. Ghiraldini's playing position is hooker.
Club career
Ghiraldini began his career with Petrarca Rugby in his home town of Padua before moving to Ru ...
was named in Italy's starting XV, but was ruled out before kick-off due to injury.
*
Owen Farrell (England) earned his 50th cap.
*
Michele Campagnaro
Michele Campagnaro (; born 13 March 1993) is an Italian professional rugby union player who primarily plays centre for Colomiers of the Pro D2. He has also represented Italy at international level, having made his test debut against Fiji during ...
scored Italy's 900th try in tests.
*Italy made the unorthodox tactical decision not to commit any players to
rucks after tacking an English ball carrier. Under the laws at the time, this meant that no
offside line formed and the Italians were free to position themselves among the English formation, threatening
interception
In ball-playing competitive team sports, an interception or pick is a move by a player involving a pass of the ball—whether by foot or hand, depending on the rules of the sport—in which the ball is intended for a player of the same team b ...
s. In reaction, the rules regarding rucks were changed later that year.
Round 4
Notes:
*
Justin Tipuric (Wales) earned his 50th test cap.
----
Notes:
*
Luca Sperandio (Italy) and
Antoine Dupont
Antoine Dupont (born 15 November 1996) is a French professional rugby union player. He currently plays at scrum half for Toulouse in the Top 14 and captains the France national team. In 2021, Dupont won World Rugby Men's 15s Player of the Year.
...
and
Fabien Sanconnie (both France) made their international debuts.
*
Guilhem Guirado
Guilhem Guirado (born 17 June 1986) is a former French rugby union player. During his 17-year career, he played for Perpignan, Toulon, and Montpellier. Guirado was also the captain of France from 2016 to 2019.
Career
Guirado first appeared on t ...
(France) earned his 50th test cap.
* France retained the
Giuseppe Garibaldi Trophy
The Giuseppe Garibaldi Trophy ( it, Trofeo Garibaldi; french: Trophée Garibaldi) is a rugby union trophy awarded to the winner of the annual Six Nations Championship match between France and Italy.
The trophy, designed by former French internati ...
.
* France's win also guaranteed Italy would win the "
wooden spoon" for coming last.
----
Notes:
*
Joe Marler
Joseph William George Marler (born 7 July 1990) is an English professional rugby union player who plays as a prop for Harlequins in the Premiership. He is also one of the hosts of The Joe Marler Show podcast with Tom Fordyce.
Background
Marl ...
(England) earned his 50th test cap.
*
Cornell du Preez (Scotland) made his international debut.
* For a second consecutive season, England claimed the Six Nations title prior to the final round.
* The 61 points scored by England is the most scored against Scotland, and the 40-point margin equalled their previous largest winning margin set in 2001 (43–3).
* This was also the most points Scotland had scored against England at Twickenham since 2005, when they scored 22 points, and the second largest number of points they had ever scored in a game away to England overall.
* England matched
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
's record of 18 consecutive wins set between August 2015 and October 2016.
* England won their 11th consecutive Six Nations match, a championship record.
* England retained the
Calcutta Cup.
Round 5
Notes:
*
Federico Ruzza
Federico Ruzza (born 4 August 1994) is an Italian professional rugby union player who primarily plays lock for Benetton of the United Rugby Championship.
Professional career
Under contract with Viadana, for 2014–15 Pro12 season, Ruzza name ...
(Italy) made his international debut.
* This was
Vern Cotter
Vern is a masculine given name, often a short form (hypocorism) of Vernon, Lavern or other names. People named Vern include:
* Vernon Vern Bakalich (1929–2015), New Zealand rugby league player
* Verdi Vern Barberis (1928–2005), Australian w ...
's last game as head coach.
* This was the first time Scotland has kept Italy scoreless.
* This was the first time, since beating
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
41–0 in 2008, that Scotland kept their opponent scoreless.
* This was Scotland's first match in the Six Nations where they kept their opponent scoreless.
* The match concluded Scotland's most successful Six Nations tournament since they won 3 games in
2006
File:2006 Events Collage V1.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2006 Winter Olympics open in Turin; Twitter is founded and launched by Jack Dorsey; The Nintendo Wii is released; Montenegro 2006 Montenegrin independence referendum, votes to declare ...
.
----
Notes:
*
Ken Owens
Kenneth James Owens (born 3 January 1987) is a Welsh rugby union player who plays as a hooker for the Scarlets and Wales. He made his debut for the Scarlets in 2006, taking over from Matthew Rees as their first-choice hooker upon Rees' departu ...
(Wales) earned his 50th test cap.
* This was France's first win over Wales since their 9–8 victory during the
2011 Rugby World Cup
The 2011 Rugby World Cup was the seventh Rugby World Cup, a quadrennial international rugby union competition inaugurated in 1987. The International Rugby Board (IRB) selected New Zealand as the host country in preference to Japan and South Af ...
.
* France finished in the top half of the table for the first time since 2011 and Wales finished in the bottom half for the first time since that same year, with fifth their lowest position since 2007.
* The winning points were scored in the 100th minute of the match in one of the longest games on record.
----
Notes:
*
Jamie Heaslip
James Peter Richard Heaslip (born 15 December 1983) is an Irish rugby union former player who played for Leinster and Ireland. He played as a number 8. Heaslip earned 95 caps for Ireland during his international career from 2006 to 2017, makin ...
withdrew from the team after suffering an injury during the pre-match warm-up. He never recovered from the injury or played again and retired in February 2018.
*
Andrew Conway (Ireland) made his international debut.
*
Tom Wood (England) earned his 50th test cap.
* This was
Eddie Jones Edward, Eddie, or Ed Jones may refer to:
Architecture
* Edward Vason Jones (1909–1980), American neoclassical architect
* Edward Jones (English architect) (born 1939), English architect who designed the Saïd Business School
* Edward Jones (Wel ...
's first loss as England coach, and England's first since losing 33–13 to
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
in the
2015 Rugby World Cup
The 2015 Rugby World Cup was the eighth Rugby World Cup, the quadrennial rugby union world championship. The tournament was hosted by England from 18 September to 31 October. Of the 20 countries competing in the World Cup in 2011, there was onl ...
.
* Ireland reclaimed the
Millennium Trophy
The Millennium Trophy () is a rugby union award contested annually by England and Ireland as part of the Six Nations Championship. It was initiated in 1988 as part of Dublin's millennial celebrations. The trophy has the shape of a horned Viking ...
.
* This was the second time in six months that Ireland had beaten a team with 18 straight wins, having also ended New Zealand's winning streak in November 2016.
Statistics
A record eight players were joint top try scorers, with Ireland flanker CJ Stander the first forward in the Six Nations era to score a hat-trick in a single match, against Italy. Stander's compatriot Craig Gilroy's own hat-trick in the same game set a new record – a replacement scoring three tries despite playing only 33 minutes in the entire tournament.
Top points scorers
Top try scorers
See also
*
2017 Women's Six Nations Championship
The 2017 Women's Six Nations Championship, also known as the 2017 RBS Women's Six Nations due to the tournament's sponsorship by the Royal Bank of Scotland, was the 16th series of the Women's Six Nations Championship, an annual women's rugby union ...
References
External links
Official site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Six Nations
2017 rugby union tournaments for national teams
2017
File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...
2016–17 in European rugby union
2016–17 in Irish rugby union
2016–17 in English rugby union
2016–17 in Welsh rugby union
2016–17 in Scottish rugby union
2016–17 in French rugby union
2016–17 in Italian rugby union
February 2017 sports events in Europe
March 2017 sports events in Europe
Royal Bank of Scotland