Some people may have noticed there is a rugby tournament being played at the moment. To be more precise the RBS 6 Nations rugby tournament. The current nations involved are England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales (in alphabetical order to avoid bias!) Each team plays each other once with home advantage rotating each year. A winning team gains 2 points, one for a draw and none for a loss. From the results a league table is constructed. This format has existed since 2000 when Italy joined the tournament. Prior to this there have been tournaments with 5 nations including France and periods of the Home Nations tournaments without France.
The winning nation receives the Championship trophy. A nation winning every game is deemed to have achieved a Grand Slam. A ‘home’ nation (England, Ireland, Scotland or Wales), which defeats the other 3 home nations, has achieved a Triple Crown. The nation finishing bottom of the table get the wooden spoon (metaphorically not physically!) Also under the 6 nations tournament the annual game between Scotland and England is played with the Calcutta Cup as a separate trophy. This dates back to 1879 with more recent additions being the Millennium trophy (1988 England v Ireland) and the Giuseppe Garibaldi trophy (2007 France and Italy).
This year the competition runs from 7th February to 21st March with the holders from last year being Wales. Good luck to all the teams this year and may the best team win.