Rugby union betting tips: Six Nations top tryscorer, points and Player of the Championship

Six Nations betting tips: Top tryscorer

2pts Damian Penaud top tryscorer at 4/1 (Coral, Ladbrokes)

1pt Penaud top tryscorer, France win title at 7/1 (Coral, Ladbrokes)

1pt e.w. Blair Kinghorn top try-corer at 80/1 (BoyleSports 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7)

• Scroll down for top points and Player of the Championship tips

DAMIAN PENAUD is understandably favourite to finish up as the Six Nations’ top tryscorer in 2024, a feat he achieved alongside fellow French wing Gabin Villiere in 2022 and in his own right in 2023. And as unoriginal as it is to say it, we can’t look past him completing a hat-trick of accolades.

Currently there is no finisher to touch him in world rugby. Josh Adams is probably the closest in calibre when taking the other fit wingers into consideration but Wales are likely to spend much of the Championship on the back foot and Adams will be reduced to trying to make a meal out of scraps.

Penaud’s confidence knows no bounds at the moment with his five tries in last year’s Six Nations followed by three in the summer and six at the World Cup: a grand total of 14 and a record in a calendar year by a northern hemisphere player.

Not that Penaud needs much time or space but with Maxime Lucu firing out the passes from scrum-half, the ball might even get to the edges quicker than with Antoine Dupont at nine, so we reckon he’ll still see plenty of ball.

The good thing with Penaud is that if he fails to score in one game you know that his next try is never far away. Last year, his record seven-game scoring run was only broken by the harrowing quarter-final defeat to South Africa and going back a bit further, he has scored in 16 of his last 25 matches – effectively every two matches in three.

While Penaud is the man to beat, we have spotted some potential value further down the list. In fact, we still can’t believe that BLAIR KINGHORN is 80/1. Kinghorn finished joint-second to Penaud along with Scotland teammate, Huw Jones, in 2023, and carries a real threat from full-back.

The former Edinburgh man scored a brace on his Toulouse debut in the Champions Cup in December and will get plenty of attacking opportunities in a Scotland team that is full of tries.

The good news is that you can back him each-way with Boyle Sports, and rather handily they are the firm quoting the best odds about the long-striding runner. If you can't get hold of that 80/1, the general 66s is more than acceptable.

Six Nations betting tips: Top points

5pts win Thomas Ramos at evens (Sky Bet, William Hill)

1pt e.w. George Ford at 10/1 (William Hill 1/3 1,2)

While we expect Penaud to grab his fair share of tries, barring any injuries his France teammate THOMAS RAMOS should be even more dominant in the points-scoring market.

Johnny Sexton’s retirement and Owen Farrell’s decision to step away from Test rugby has rid Ramos of two of his main rivals for the golden boot award.

And with serious question marks about the fitness of Marcus Smith – who always gives you a good run for your money given his capacity to score tries – another very real contender could have fallen by the wayside.

Ramos bagged 84 points in last year’s Six Nations – the second best tally by an individual for a single Championship and 49 more than any other player – and would have almost certainly been top of the pile again at the World Cup had France not slipped up in the quarter-finals.

Looking beyond Ramos, it is hard to state the case for any other player. Finn Russell’s goal-kicking for Bath has been well below average and it wouldn’t be a surprise if he ended up sharing the responsibility, therefore diminishing his capacity to accumulate points.

Ireland, meanwhile, have four fly-half options, none of whom are over 80% in their goal-kicking stats this season, while Wales don’t have a settled 10 or goal-kicker, either.

At a push, you could state the case for Tommaso Allan, especially at odds of 50/1, but Italy don’t tend to score enough points as a team and Allan’s best return in a single Championship is the 41 he managed in 2018. No player has topped the points-scoring charts with fewer than 50 points in the history of the Six Nations.

The only person we can see challenging Ramos is GEORGE FORD. Depending on the severity of Smith’s injury, Ford could have a good run in the England No.10 jersey and be presented with enough opportunities to bag a fair few points.

Ford finished the 2015 Six Nations as the top points scorer with 75 and his ability to drop goals as well as consistently bisect the poles from the kicking tee marks him out as one to watch.

Six Nations betting tips: Player of the Championship

1pt Cameron Woki at 66/1 (Sky Bet, BoyleSports)

The subjective nature of Player of the Championship awards makes it a tough market to predict but one player we like the look of is France’s loose forward CAMERON WOKI.

Woki was a star of the dominant France U20s team while still only 18 but it has taken him a while to translate that form onto the senior stage. Finally, though, the now 25-year-old appears to have come of age.

The Racing 92 player started all five of France’s matches at the World Cup at lock and is set for a similarly prominent role in the Six Nations, especially with some of the more established players around him injured.

His captain, No.8 Gregory Alldritt, collects Player of the Match awards for fun for club and country and is understandably the favourite; however if you are looking for value, you won’t get much better than the 66/1 about Woki, available with BoyleSports and Sky Bet.

Woki’s athleticism, in the lineout and in the loose, sets him apart from other forwards in his position and he also has the added bonus of a relatively clean disciplinary sheet. He has yet to receive a yellow card in his 27-cap Test career and it is two years since he was sent to the sin-bin in any form of senior rugby.

Born in the shadow of the Stade de France, Woki won’t be as close to the comforts of home with France taking to the road, but as he enters his fourth year of international rugby, this could be the Championship where he truly delivers on his potential.

Posted at 1200 GMT on 31/01/24

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