There are Zen masters who can apparently stay calm whatever the circumstances.
It isn’t clear, though, that any of them have sampled a week in Welsh rugby. Want to know a bit about turbulence? Then the oval-ball sport in Wales might be your first port of call.
Tuesday this week saw a Wales team announcement cancelled amid a strike threat by national squad players.
READ MORE: Warren Gatland rips up Wales team to play England with nine changes and Dan Biggar dropped
Wednesday saw meetings of powerbrokers and then a gathering of players before industrial action was averted at the 11th hour.
Thursday? Well, that’s seen Warren Gatland rip up his Wales team with nine changes for the game with England at the weekend.
Doubtless, there will be more drama over the next 48 hours and beyond.
Anyway, here are the main headlines on Gatland’s team selection to face Steve Borthwick’s side.
Biggar axed, Williams gets his chance
After Wales lost to Ireland in 1970, with Gareth Edwards and Barry John uncharacteristically out of sorts, a selector said to Edwards at the post-match dinner: “Make the most of this evening, Gareth.”
Edwards feared he might be left out for the next game. It didn’t happen.
But if his next performance had been off-key, who knows? No-one is undroppable.
Dan Biggar will know that, of course, having been omitted plenty of times over the course of his 14-year Test career. He has always battled back, because resilience is in his DNA.
Even so, being benched for a Six Nations game against England in Cardiff would not have been part of his plan.
He’s among backs who’ve paid the price for an uninspiring effort behind the scrum against Scotland last time out. Creativity took something of a holiday.
Biggar has drive and a ferocious will to win, but Gatland needs to unlock the talent in this Welsh backline and Owen Williams gets a chance to do that this weekend.
He performed superbly for the Ospreys either side of Christmas and has yet to lose a match in which he has started this season. Good omen, then. Williams makes good decisions, executes well and knows how to run a game.
“We need to find out about that 10 position, so Owen gets a chance,” said Gatland.
Biggar will dust himself down and regroup. But it is an opportunity for Williams to put down a marker in the jerysey, for the rest of this Six Nations and indeed the World Cup.
The return of the other old guard
Biggar may have been dropped, but other members of the old guard return. Namely Justin Tipuric, Alun Wyn Jones and Taulupe Faletau, while Leigh Halfpenny is also back.
None of them were in the starting line-up for the carnage at Murrayfield, though Faletau was on the bench.
Gatland had said Wales wanted to look at different players to build depth for the World Cup but this is a Six Nations Test against England at home and it’s hard to put a price on experience and especially up front where the match will be won and lost.
Tipuric takes the No. 7 shirt ahead of Tommy Reffell and Jac Morgan. The youngsters are major prospects who are going to win plenty more caps. But in the aftermath of Wales' defeat by Ireland in round one, too many people seemed a shade eager to write Tipuric out of the script.
It seemed odd, for the man in the blue hat can do everything — defend, attack, lead, contest the breakdowns, shine in the wide channels, win lineout ball.
“I watched Tipuric playing for the Ospreys the other week and he was different gravy,” Mark Ring told WalesOnline last weekend. “I’d have him in my team every time because no-one else has his skill set.”
It's not a poor point to make.
Faletau’s effort off the bench against the Scots reminded us of his quality, while Jones is a leader, a player Gatland evidently still believes in. The challenge for Jones will be to roll back the years and confound those who question his place in the side at the age of 37.
These three players have also been around long enough not to be overly affected by the unsettling events of the past few days.
The 20-year-old Daf Jenkins is on the bench to add impetus for Jones if needed.
But belief has been placed in the old guard up front as starters.
Halfpenny and Rees-Zammit back
Same with Leigh Halfpenny, who also returns. The assumption is discipline has cost Liam Williams after yellow cards against Ireland and Scotland. He is a buccaneering counter runner who can inspire those around him with his courage and running, but Gatland was angry with the number of penalties Wales gave away in Edinburgh and the Cardiff full-back has paid the price.
Halfpenny will make his first Wales start since the summer of 2021. He doesn’t have Williams’ swagger. But he remains an outstanding reader of play, a courageous defender and a goalkicker to compare with the best.
As for Louis Rees-Zammit, the buzz of excitement that swept around Kingsholm whenever he touched the ball in his comeback game for Gloucester last weekend underlined that the 22-year-old is no ordinary player.
With him, quarter chances can be turned into tries and opponents need to be on maximum alert whenever he has the ball.
The challenge for Wales is to create space for him.
Rio Dyer made the odd mistake against Scotland but he has largely looked dangerous and doesn’t drop his head. In some ways he can count himself unlucky to be left out because he’s offered a fair bit in attack in this campaign while Josh Adams has yet to fire.
Presumably, Adams has credit in the bank. But Gatland will want him to re-engage his best form.
Form rewarded
When Wales lost to Scotland at Murrayfield in 2007, it was said of Alun Wyn Jones that at times he appeared to be taking on the opposition on his own. The then 21-year-old piled up tackles and didn’t stop grafting. It was a remarkable display in adversity that flagged up that Wales had a special player in their ranks.
Christ Tshiunza didn’t earn similar headlines after his effort at Murrayfield a week last Saturday, but he did front up in a losing cause.
His carrying came with a dynamism that augurs well, with metres made post-contact; he won five lineouts on Welsh ball and picked off an opposition throw; he claimed a turnover; and he defended stoutly, with a hit on the dangerous Duhan van der Merwe in full flight proving one of the most memorable moments of the Six Nations campaign so far for Wales.
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Here, then was a piece that slotted into the jigsaw, the number six Wales have been searching for, potentially a player they could build a pack around.
The way he stuck to his task when the tide was flowing strongly the other way said much. That’s what exceptional players do.
So Tshiunza keeps his place. Deservedly so.
Rookie Mason replaces North
We will let Warren Gatland sing the plaudits of the 20-year-old who replaces George North at outside centre.
"We’ve given Mason Grady a first cap. He’s a big lad, he’s got some really lovely rugby skills and offloading ability. He’s quick, so he’s the kind of centre that I think is going to have everything going forward. He’s got a good rugby head on him."
Gatland has previously said the Cardiff youngster had been “training the house down”.
North hasn’t fired in this Six Nations and Wales are looking to see what else is in the cupboard. Grady has a chance to show what he can do and that the 6ft 5in, 17st 5lb player is a prospect is not in doubt. He is a centre with a wing’s speed who can handle and break tackles.
He is raw and matching him in midfield with a fellow 20-year-old in Joe Hawkins is a big call, but Wales are trying to accelerate the development of a number of young players ahead of the World Cup and the pair shone in the U20 Summer Series last year.
They have Nick Tompkins on the bench. But Grady has promise.
Fresh props
Gareth Thomas and Tom Francis have helped the Ospreys boast one of the strongest scrums in the United Rugby Championship, so their return to the Wales starting lineout should give Wales a solid front-row platform.
That will be the selectors’ hope, at least. The Welsh props weren’t the worst players in red on view against Scotland, but Thomas is a solid scrummager who is also an expert chop tackler and Francis is a redoubtable set-piece performer.
It’s going to be a challenge, mind. England will have a prop in Ellis Genge who has a huge workrate around the field and Kyle Sinckler is no slouch as well.
Gatland will doubtless have pointed such matters out to their Wales counterparts.
Their work will only start at the scrum. Wales need them to go well in other areas, too.
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