England v Scotland Double Header

It's the battle of the auld enemies!

AI generated

In the blue corner, a bunch of skirt wearing carrot tops who last saw the sun shine in August 1907. A country whose national flower is a weed and whose cuisine is anything and everything deep fried. As a people they reached their cultural peak in 1988 when The Proclaimers released I'm Gonna Be and even that only reached number 11 in the charts as if to once and all confirm that anything that manages to escape their gloomy lands is ultimately doomed to mediocracy.

In the white corner, a group of uptight shandy drinking mummys' boys whose desire to keep a stiff upper lip simply underlines what a bunch of cry babies they are. Their national pride and joy are the Royal Family, a group of inbred German sex offenders. Somehow this nation of shopkeepers used to rule the world, now all they have are rose tinted spectacles and 'soft power' which sounds like a case of collective impotence if you ask me.

Or to put it more simply it's Scotland versus England this weekend.

In fact, it's Scotland versus England x 2 because the cricket teams take on one another in the T20 World Cup before the rugby boys go at it in the Six Nations.

The outcome of both have the potential to have a significant impact on the short and long term ambitions of their respective nations in each sport.

England's defeat to the West Indies in the T20 World Cup on Wednesday leaves them in 4th place in the group thanks to a very poor net run rate.

With Scotland having trounced Italy who themselves upset Nepal, then it feels like this is the deciding game for who will get 2nd spot and a place in the round 2.

After a difficult winter, a game against feisty underdogs in Scotland is probably the last thing this England side needs.
A win is a minimum requirement against a team that didn't even qualify for the tournament in their own right. A defeat would be the cherry on the top of the shit pie that the players and management would need to eat on return to the UK next week if they don't make it through.

The man whose position would be most at risk should England fail in this format too is Brendon McCullum. Having only taken on the role of white ball coach alongside his Test duties just over 12 months ago, his position in charge of the side is precarious enough following the team's abysmal showing in the Ashes, coupled with a number of high-profile off pitch incidents.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/wpe-cXHrfBY
Conviction sure but ultimately you've got to get the results!

With a relatively fresh group of players and some convincing performances in the bilateral series against Sri Lanka that proceeded the World Cup, it looked like things were on the up.

However, England's most experienced players haven't really shown-up yet in this World Cup and you wonder if the relationship with the coaching set-up might be under strain.

Someone's head will have to roll if England fail at another major tournament. Jos Buttler was the fall guy this time last year as England crashed out of the Champions Trophy and while current captain Harry Brook's stock is not exactly high at the moment, you'd be surprised if England's senior management wanted to throw a player of his unique talents under the bus at this stage of his career.

Can McCullum get this side up and motivated for this game?

He'll have to! We know that Scotland will almost certainly raise their game for the occasion and lets be honest, they have nothing to lose!

Bizarrely these 2 neighbours have only ever met once before in T20 cricket and that was at the last World Cup where rain saved England's blushes.

Scotland were 90 without loss after 10 overs when the heavens opened in Bridgetown and have no doubt been itching to get a chance at redemption ever since!

Those of us intent on watching both matches should have a good 3 hours in between the cricket finishing and the rugby starting to get the house work done and complete our husbandly duties on what is after all Valentines Day.

Then it'll be back to the sofa, beer in hand and ready to watch 30 big lads lying on top of each other in the mud - that's some people's idea of Valentines day every year!

While England are definitely favourites for this one too, the pressure is very much on a Scotland side whose development appears to have stalled if not regressed over the last couple of years.

Defeat by Italy in the opening match of the Six Nations was a bitter pill to swallow. However, if there was ever a fixture to get the team and the fans' energy levels back up it would be this one.

England squeaked past Scotland last year by a solitary point in a low scoring game at Twickenham, and in doing so registered their first win against the Scots since 2020.

In fact, low scoring is often the name of the game when these rivals meet with 9 of their last 20 matches prior to that finishing with a total of 30 or fewer points.

The Scots will be looking to do something similar on Saturday and drag their more skillful English opponents into a gritty slog where they struggle to get the momentum with which they know they can dominate proceedings.

One thing that has so often helped in that regard is the Edinburgh weather but that doesn't look likely to be the case this year with a clear, still day forecast.

Perfect conditions at Murrayfield tomorrow

England haven't lost a game for over a year following their strong finish to last year's Six Nations and a clean sweep of their opponents in both the summer and autumn internationals. Confidence is sky high and they'd collectively back themselves to withstand the Scottish onslaught before showing their superiority in all aspects of the game.