Warburton: Six Nations is wide open

Wales flanker Sam Warburton has predicted a wide-open RBS 6 Nations Championship this season – with no team winning the Grand Slam.

England put themselves in pole position for a full-scale assault on their first championship clean sweep since 2003 after last night’s 26-19 victory over Wales at the Millennium Stadium.

England’s next three games – against Italy, France and Scotland – are at Twickenham – before they conclude the campaign by tackling Ireland in Dublin.

But Warburton said: “I don’t think any team is going to win the Grand Slam this year – it’s a pretty level playing field.

“England are probably the (title) favourites, but it is wide open.

“From our perspective, there are still four games left, and a lot can happen in that time. We’ve still got to believe in ourselves.”

While England have teed themselves up to target Six Nations silverware, Wales must reflect on an eighth successive Test match without a win.

They face Scotland at Murrayfield next weekend, before heading to Rome and finally Paris after hosting Ireland seven days previously, and the victory drought is leaving its mark.

Not since the final game of last season’s Six Nations – against Italy in Cardiff – have Wales tasted success.

“The margins are so small,” added Warburton.

“One missed tackle, and it’s suddenly seven points conceded, which is a large gap in international rugby. You are chasing the game.

“It’s the same for us every time, always silly little errors.

“It is impossible to go 80 minutes without making errors, but we’ve maybe got to be more clinical in attack and just build the scoreboard.

“The errors we are making stand out like a sore thumb. You make one small error and you get punished at this level.

“Credit to England, they committed numbers to the breakdown and kept the ball for phases, which really put our defence under pressure.

“They played pretty well. They are probably (title) favourites now, whereas we’ve got three away games and it’s looking uphill.

“The mood in the squad has been really good over the last couple of weeks, and we don’t feel that far away, but we’ve said that so many times. We’ve played pretty well again and we haven’t won.

“We know the Six Nations is about results. but we’ve got to move on and focus on areas where we can exploit Scotland and do our best to get the win.

“We didn’t really take advantage when England had a player (lock Louis Deacon) sin-binned.

“You should be looking at scoring seven to 10 points when an opposition player is sin-binned (Wales scored three), and we were suddenly chasing the game.

“We always seem to be in that situation, and we couldn’t quite haul it back.

“But there is definitely no doubt in the squad that we can win games and still go for the championship.”

The Wales camp reported only “bumps and bruises” at their training camp today, despite the punishing nature of last night’s encounter.

Number eight Andy Powell went off in the first-half and had an ice pack immediately applied to his left shoulder, although there appears no major concern surrounding the Wasps forward’s fitness for Edinburgh.

He could though, find his place under pressure from former Wales captain Ryan Jones, who made a considerable impact in all areas after replacing Powell six minutes before the break.