Antoine Dupont’s France are fancied but it’s cheeky to bet against Ireland as they bid for a Six Nations three-peat

Okay, pay attention. The key word is ‘momentum’. If you’re a casual fan and need just one conversation filler with friends or colleagues this evening, to make it sound like you have something to offer to the Six Nations chat beyond the magnificence of Antoine Dupont’s cheekbones, this is it. It’s all about momentum. Enthusiastic agreement ensues, you pop off to get the next round in, and if the conversation hasn’t moved on by the time you return, you still have the French superstar’s cheekbones up your sleeve. So to speak.

Spoiler alert, the chat won’t have moved on. There is so much to dissect and speculate upon ahead of this year’s Six Nations that you’d be hard-pushed to fit it into one evening, never mind one round. And, as any sports fan worth their salt and vinegar crisps will tell you, at least half of the fun of sport is in the build-up. And what a build-up we have. Nowhere is the ‘m’ word more important in the opening weekend than at the Aviva Stadium tomorrow. Ireland welcome England to Dublin, though ‘welcome’ may be too cordial a word for the side who ended their chances of a back-to-back Grand Slam last year.

It is a crucial game for both, for very different reasons. Despite beating the then-world No.1 team, England lost to both France and Scotland in last year’s Championship, conceding a fourth Calcutta Cup to the Scots in a row. Steve Borthwick and his men go into this tournament with a heck of a lot to prove. Can they turn their recent run of oh-so-nearlies in the autumn into skin-of-your-teeths or even better? Can they consistently close out an 80 minutes on top and deliver on all their individual talent as a collective?.

Then there’s Ireland, defending champions despite their Twickenham disappointment, and not only aiming for an historic three-peat, but to steady the ship amid a storm of speculation over their supposed decline. Their 19-game unbeaten run at home was recently ended by New Zealand and the circling pack is ready to pounce should that fallibility turn out to be serious. If tomorrow’s game does not yet give us certain answers to the questions over England and Ireland’s respective trajectories, at the very least it will set the parameters for the fixtures to come.

If I started this column by giving you an easy entry point to Six Nations conversations, then your bridging chat should centre around France. Every analyst and pundit, to a woman and man, seems to have agreed this year’s title is for the French to lose, in no small part thanks to the formidable talent attached to those aforementioned cheekbones. Dupont returns to the 15s version of the game after skipping last year to concentrate on the sevens, and an ultimately triumphant bid for the Olympic title on home soil.

But if you have read this far, you deserve a little more depth. Yes, France finished second last year in the absence of their talisman, but even with his return, the near unanimous writing-off of Ireland is a curiosity, borne perhaps of something a little deeper. According to analytics outfit Opta, whose supercomputer simulated the tournament a total of 10,000 times, Ireland actually have a 63 per cent chance of the title, while France’s hopes stand at 29 per cent. We all know the saying about damned lies and statistics, but why the discrepancy between the ideas of man and machine?.

Well, we used to be familiar with the ABE effect – supporting Anyone But England. Has it migrated and morphed across the Irish Sea to become ABI? National allegiances aside, we all want to see variety at the top of elite sport. Perhaps the widespread French tipping is as much wish as prediction. Surely if Ireland can sort out their lineout issues in particular, they should be the favourites, especially with home games against both England and France?.

Even among Irish observers it feels like an element of win fatigue has set in. An esteemed Irish rugby journalist I spoke to at the Six Nations launch, articulated my suspicions perfectly: ‘We’re a nation of fighters, we’re the underdogs. It goes against our culture to not only win but to be expected to keep winning.’ Maybe even Irish fans need a little bit of jeopardy to get that fighting spirit back again.

As ever, it’s the bigger picture that’s as interesting as the games. Ireland still on top or France to put home World Cup disappointment behind them for good? Wales in the doldrums or liberated by lack of expectation? England’s troubles coming to an end and Italy delivering on their exciting promise of recent seasons?. Whatever happens, we will once again have to wait to see what a fully fit, well-oiled Scotland could achieve, blighted as they are by misfortune and injury.