There are four matches for which we give statistics this week - New Zealand vs Ireland, Australia vs England, South Africa vs France and Argentina vs Scotland as the Northern Hemisphere invades the Southern Hemisphere.

The statistics for the scrums in Australia are appalling.

Sanctions

Red Card

Jamie Heaslip (Ireland) - kneeing opponent in the head - suspended for five weeks.

Yellow cards

Ronan O'Gara (Ireland) - playing opponent without the ball
Ma'afu (Australia) - repeated scrum infringements
Flippie van der Merwe (South Africa) - deliberate infringement
Dimitri Yachvili (France) - deliberate infringement
Juan Leguizamón (Argentina) - repeated tackle infringements

Citing

Mark Cueto (England) - dangerous tackle

Penalties conceded

In this section we record the times a team was penalised.

(i) New Zealand vs Ireland

Total number of penalties: 15

New Zealand: 10
Ireland: 5

The reasons for the penalties were as follows:

* = points conceded

New Zealand:
Tackle/ruck: 3 (Read & McCaw, Vito, Read)
Offside: 3 (Rokocoko, Cruden, Stanley)
Scrum: 1 (Tialata)
Discipline: 3 (Owen Franks - obstruction; Stanley - diving on player on the ground; De Malmanche - swinging arm)

Ireland:
Tackle/ruck: 2 (Buckley*, Tuohy)
Discipline: 3 (Heaslip - knee to head twice; O'Gara - man without ball; Healy - man without ball)

New Zealand kicked the only penalty at goal.

Tackles/Penalties

This gives the number of penalties at ruck/tackle as a fraction of the total number of penalties: 5/15

Getting possession - line-outs, scrums, free-kicks, drop-outs, turn-overs

In this section the figures represent the number of times you get to play with the ball.

New Zealand:

Line-outs: 11 (3 quick)
Scrums: 3 (1 collapse)
Free-kicks: 1 (scrum)
Drop-outs: 2

Ireland:

Line-outs: 10 (1 lost, 1 quick)
Scrums: 5 (3 reset, 4 collapses, 2 free kicks)
Free-kicks: 1 (scrum)
Drop-outs: 1

Stoppages (total of line-outs, scrums with resets, free kicks, penalties, drop-outs): 52

This is a remarkably low number.

Tries

This is the number of tries each team scored.

New Zealand: 9
Ireland: 4

Tries/penalties scored

This gives the ratio of tries scored to penalties scored by each team:

New Zealand: 9/1
Ireland: 4/0

(ii) Australia vs England

Total number of penalties: 19

Australia: 12
England: 7

The reasons for the penalties were as follows:

* = points conceded

Australia:
Tackle/ruck: 2 (Ma'afu)
Scrum: 10 (Daley 4, Ma'afu** 4, Brown - hands, Slipper*)

England:
Tackle/ruck: 4 (Easter 2, Haskell, Lawes*)
Offside: 2 (Palmer, Chuter*)
Scrum: 1 (Payne)

Each side missed a penalty kick at goal.

Tries/penalties scored

This gives the number of penalties at ruck/tackle as a fraction of the total number of penalties:

Australia vs England: 6/19

Getting possession - line-outs, scrums, free-kicks, drop-outs, turn-overs

In this section the figures represent the number of times you get to play with the ball.

Australia:

Line-outs: 11 (1 lost)
Scrums: 9  (2 reset, 9 collapses, 1 free kick, 2 penalties)
Free-kicks: 1 (scrum)
Drop-outs: 1

England:

Line-outs: 14 (1 lost, 1 quick)
Scrums: 16 (9 reset, 23 collapses, 1 free kick, 2 penalty tries, 7 penalties)
Free-kicks: 3 (1 scrum, 2 marks)
Drop-outs: 1 

This is an appalling scrum statistic - surely unacceptable at any level of rugby.

Stoppages (total of line-outs, scrums with resets, free kicks, penalties, drop-outs): 84

Tries

This is the number of tries each team scored.

Australia: 3
England: 2

Tries/penalties scored

This gives the ratio of tries scored to penalties scored by each team:

Australia: 3/2
England: 2/1

(iii) South Africa vs France

Total number of penalties: 27

South Africa: 10
France: 17

The reasons for the penalties were as follows:

* = points conceded

South Africa:
Tackle/ruck: 5 (Habana, Potgieter, Matfield, De Villiers, Pienaar)
Offside: 2 (Burger, Januarie)
Scrum: 2 (BJ Botha)
Discipline: 1 (BJ Botha - obstruction)

France:
Tackle/ruck: 7 (Clerc 2, Poitrenaud*, Nallet, Marty, Rougerie, Pierre)
Offside: 2 (Szarzewski, Pierre)
Scrum: 3 (Domingo, Poux* 2)
Discipline: 5 (Dusautoir* - man without ball; Marty - high tackle; Parra - throwing ball away; ?? - man without ball; Yachvili - throwing ball away)

Neither side missed a penalty kick at goal.

Tackles/Penalties

This gives the number of penalties at ruck/tackle as a fraction of the total number of penalties:

South Africa: vs France: 12/27

Getting possession - line-outs, scrums, free-kicks, drop-outs, turn-overs

In this section the figures represent the number of times you get to play with the ball.

South Africa:

Line-outs: 13
Scrums: 11 (2 reset, 1 free kick, 1 penalty)
Free-kicks: 2 (1 mark, 1 scrum)
Drop-outs: 0

France:

Line-outs: 11 (3 lost, 1 skew)
Scrums: 11 (6 reset, 4 collapses, 1 free kick, 2 penalties, 1 wheel)
Free-kicks: 1 (mark)
Drop-outs: 0

Stoppages (total of line-outs, scrums with resets, free kicks, penalties, drop-outs): 84

(iv) Argentina vs Scotland

Total number of penalties: 18

Argentina: 13
Scotland: 5

The reasons for the penalties were as follows:

* = points conceded

Argentina:
Tackle/ruck: 9 (Albacete, Roncero* 2, Scelzo, Leguizamon* 2, Ayerza, Contepomi*, Gonzalez)
Offside: 4 (Contepomi*, Scelzo, Albacete, Lalanne)

Scotland:
Tackle/ruck: 2 (Jacobsen, Lamont)
Scrum: 2 (Ford*, Jacobsen)
Discipline: 1 (Strokosch* - air tackle)

Scotland missed three penalty kicks at goal.

Tackles/Penalties

This gives the number of penalties at ruck/tackle as a fraction of the total number of penalties:

Argentina vs Scotland: 11/18

Getting possession - line-outs, scrums, free kicks, drop-outs, turn-overs

In this section the figures represent the number of times you get to play with the ball.

Argentina vs Scotland

Argentina:

Line-outs: 8 (2 lost, 1 free kick)
Scrums: 8 (3 reset, 4 collapses, 3 free kicks, 1 penalty)
Free-kicks: 3 (scrums)
Drop-outs: 3

Scotland:

Line-outs: 10 (1 skew)
Scrums: 10 (1 reset, 2 free kicks)
Free-kicks: 2 (scrums)
Drop-outs: 0

Stoppages (total of line-outs, scrums with resets, free kicks, penalties, drop-outs): 68

Tries

This is the number of tries each team scored.

Argentina vs Scotland:

Argentina: 2
Scotland: 0

Tries/penalties scored

This gives the ratio of tries scored to penalties scored by each team:

Argentina: 2/2
Scotland: 0/6