It's time of the year again and to be quite honest it couldn't have come any sooner. Dust off the cobwebs, whip out the Men In Black mind eraser gizmo and forget that the World Cup ever happened, the Six Nations is almost here and in case you needed any proof of that, Warren Gatland has kicked off the mind games.
We always tend to sound very petty whenever the Wales boss tries to say something nice about Ireland but it's only because we know better than to fall for it. Speaking after he announced his 37 man squad for the upcoming campaign, Gatland was asked about his thoughts on the tournament.
As you'd expect he was asked for his thoughts on Ireland's chances ahead of the opening weekend which sees Joe Schmidt's side take on Wales in the Aviva on February 7th. As is his want, Gatland was having none of the wounded Irish storyline that we've been wallowing in for the past couple of months.
They would like to go in with people writing them off, even though they have won the championship for the last two years. They have to go in as favourites. You write an Irish team off at your peril.
We go into this tournament respecting them immensely, and particularly what they have achieved under Joe Schmidt over the last two seasons. I think they are favourites for the tournament, given the experience they have at knowing how to win, particularly under pressure.
Disgusting comments. How dare he.
We jest of course but history has thought us to take Gatland's comments with a healthy dose of scepticism. He's not exactly trying to hide the fact that he feels Ireland are playing the underdog card but the reality of the situation is that Ireland's World Cup exit has seen us fall behind both England and Wales in terms of the likely winners. Bookies have England as clear favourites with Wales and Ireland chopping and changing around the 3/1 mark.
To be fair to Gatland it is rather curious that Ireland have seemingly been damaged by the World Cup more than our Six Nations rivals. At the end of the day it was just one defeat with a severely depleted side and it's easy to see why he doesn't want his team to think of Ireland as a wounded animal there for the taking.
Joe Schmidt names his squad on Wednesday afternoon and while there won't be the outright confidence that there was last year, we'll still be fancy our chances. Even if we do play them down whenever Gatland is listening.
It's good to have competitive international rugby back again.
