England’s opening match will be their 250th at Twickenham as they look to continue their 100% record against Italy, in their first match of this year’s tournament.

Flanker Steffon Armitage is poised to make his international debut alongside brother Delon and the pair will become only the ninth set of siblings to play in the same England team.

Italy are fielding a strong side, Mauro Bergamasco, normally a flanker, starts at scrum-half for Italy. The brother of Italy winger Mirco has also played on the wing for the Azzurri, and Italy coach Nick Mallett said he “didn’t have much choice” at number nine. “This is something I want to try. Mauro has no fear of these type of games and I hope he has a great game against England,” said Mallet. “This is a difficult game for Mauro but the whole team is behind him.”

Italy may not have beaten England yet but came close last year with a 23-19 loss in Rome. Nevertheless it would still be a major shock if they were to prevail at Twickenham. Read the rest of this entry »

Luton airport AGAIN. Starting to feel like Tom Hanks in The Terminal, pity they don’t charge for the trolleys here.

Due to the recent bad weather, snow, cancellations, rescheduling…. I thought an update on the status of flights at Luton airport was due. If you read my other post ( click “italy tourism” under the “Select postings by category”) you’ll realise my flight was cancelled on Thursday, so here we are again back at Luton airport ready for Saturday 7/02/09 departures from Luton airport.

Today on the news, websites, it was looking bad. Luton airport runway closed, shuttle bus to Luton airport cancelled, they even advised on BBC regional news to walk from Luton railway station !!! so i thought i’d set off early and make sure i made it. Well I obviously am not the only one, the depature lounge is full, people sleeping, chatting, blogging, drinking and even singing.

Buses are now running to Luton airport, so you can get here. The M1 is clear and the road to Luton airport is also clear. Access is good!! The car parks are snowed over, so go carefully parking up.  A few late departures from Luton airport have been CANCELLED, others rescheduled. This is worrying.

Non of the early morning flights have been cancelled. SO fingers crossed, if it doesn’t freeze over night we should all be heading off to our destinations.

PS. There is a group of guys in the bar, one has just started playing the guitar and singing. This is not Friday Night airport planned entertainment, but the guys good. OTher travellers are huddling in for a sing along. Its good to still see society can be friendly. The guys even just got an applause and the airport staff are joining in.

Have a safe and good journey.

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