Friday the 13th is notorious for bringing bad luck and the Guinness Six Nations has seen no shortage of unfortunate moments over the years.
From the once in a lifetime bizarre moments to heartbreak at the death, the Championship has seen it all – here are five particularly unlucky moments to mark this rare date in the calendar…
Venditti scores bizarre try
They say always follow up a kick to expect the unexpected but when Giovanbattista Venditti chased Tomasso Allan’s penalty in the dying seconds of Italy’s clash with England at Twickenham in 2017, he could have been forgiven for being caught unaware.
Allan’s kick was on the 22-metre line, just to the left of the posts, but his effort crashed into the right upright.
The ball could have gone anywhere from that point but in this instance it bounced straight into the path of Venditti, catching the unfortunate England players off guard.
Venditti sprinted onto the ball and had the power to dive over, scoring one of the most bizarre tries in the history of the Championship.
Dulin breaks Wales hearts at the death
Wales were merely seconds away from a Grand Slam in Paris, leading 30-27 with the clock in the red.
But down to 13 men after two late yellow cards, Wales were under the cosh as Les Bleus looked to ruin their party and keep their own title chance alive.
After 11 phases and with France on Wales’ five metre line, the ball came out wide, with the ball finding full-back Brice Dulin in the corner.
Dulin finished off a flowing move to spoil the Wales party and end any possible chance of a Grand Slam for Wayne Pivac.
Haskell denied by the posts!
One of the more famous moments of bad luck came when England flanker James Haskell was denied what would have been a famous and vital try in Cardiff by… the post.
England, trailing 16-15 with little more than 20 minutes left to go, found themselves in a great position when Ben Youngs found Haskell with nothing but grass in front of him.
Haskell had the pace and was met by Alex Cuthbert and Leigh Halfpenny, who could only push Haskell over the line.
Except he did not go over the line. He crashed into the post and fell backwards. More fortunately for Haskell, England went on to win the match 21-16.
Williams prevented from scoring by wonder tackle
On this occasion in an England versus Wales battle, it was a Wales player who could feel aggrieved.
Wales trailed 12-3 at Twickenham just after the hour mark when Gareth Anscombe scooped up the ball and made metres from a kick.
Eventually hauled down, he managed to get an offload away and Hadleigh Parkes found Ken Owens, who in turn released George North.
Wales had a three-on-one and seemed destined to score when Scott Williams had the ball in hand diving five metres out.
He slid in, making it seemingly impossible not to score, but Sam Underhill had other ideas and managed to get under him to somehow force him into touch in a moment of defensive genius.
Bouncing ball causes Hogg havoc
In dire conditions at BT Murrayfield, England and Scotland were locked at 3-3 in a tense battle for the Calcutta Cup in 2020.
George Ford put a sneaky kick through the middle of the Scotland defence and the ball would not stop bouncing, leaving Hogg in the horrible position of trying to scoop the ball up on his own five metre line.
They say you make your own luck and, with Jonathan Joseph and Owen Farrell closing in, Hogg was forced to dive on the ball over his line and gift England a five-metre scrum.
England initially felt they had scored through Farrell, but Hogg had touched it down just in time.
Unfortunately for Hogg, that only delayed the inevitable and after one phase from the scrum, Ellis Genge picked the ball up at the base of the ruck to score and set England on their way to victory.
