It’s not over yet.

England’s hopes of a Grand Slam were ended at the hands of Wales last night in the Six Nations with Warren Gatland’s men pulling off a famous 21-13 win.

Wales are now firm favourites to clinch a Six Nations Grand Slam of their own, but the championship is far from over given the exact nature of the result (no bonus-point for either team).

England are not done yet. and defending champions Ireland could also come into the mix with a big win against Italy today. Joe Schmidt’s men will need a bonus-point win at the very least – but may also need to rack up as big a score as possible.

So providing Ireland get the job done in Rome, here’s what’s still to come:

Round 4
Scotland vs Wales
England vs Italy
Ireland vs France

So obviously Wales will need to beat Scotland to keep it in their hands and given the latter’s current injury problems, we reckon Gatland’s men will get the job done.

Then of course we expect England to get a BP win over Italy, and Ireland will need to do the same against France (no easy task given how improved they were yesterday).

That would leave things looking like this on the final day:

1. Wales – 16 points
2. England – 15 points
3. Ireland – 14 points.

And here are the fixtures for the final round:

Round 5
Italy vs France
Wales vs Ireland
England vs Scotland

So what would Ireland need in that case in Round 5? A number of things actually, with a likely BP against Wales in Cardiff being the biggest one. A huge task for any team.

Here’s what Ireland will likely need overall:

1. Beat Wales and score 4+ tries to get a BP.
2. Need England to not get a BP against Scotland.
3. Also need to beat England’s scoring points difference.

Things of course could be a lot more achievable if Scotland manage to draw with or beat England in Twickenham. Ireland would then only need to beat Wales by any margin in Cardiff.

It still looks pretty unlikely that Ireland will win this year’s championship (I personally think Wales can go all the way). But regardless of what happens – the championship is now a whole lot more interesting thanks to last night’s result.