Saturday will mark the final day of the Rugby Six Nations tournament and England will be looking to break a number of records. They have already won the tournament but if they beat Ireland in their final game they’ll make it a grand slam and will also break the record number of games unbeaten. In tribute to this institution of northern hemisphere rugby IJGlobal pits the two against one another for infrastructure investment.

England runs far ahead of Ireland in terms of deals closed since 2012, closing 44 more transport and social infrastructure transactions in the time period. The total value of those deals was $20.4 billion.

England also pushes forward in the procurement stats. According to IJGlobal data England has 103 new projects in procurement, compared to 21 in Ireland. However if we dissect the numbers and look at the number of deals in procurement in comparison to the number of deals closed in each country since 2012, Ireland tries to pull ahead. There has certainly been a greater uptick in deal flow in Ireland – 133% more deals in procurement than those closed since 2012. In comparison there are 94% more deals in procurement than the number closed since 2012.

And Ireland has more in the pipeline – the Department for Education and Skills last month announced that it will complete 46 building projects dedicated to educational use. The picture for England is less optimistic but a new round of PF2 procurement is expected any day now.

Of the three largest deals closed in each country in 2016, procurement time was generally quicker in England. With the exception of the UK Military Flying Training System, a deal which is essentially a PFI within a PFI and one that has been doing the rounds since the early 2000s. Ireland on the other hand was more consistent with its procurement with an average procurement time of 34 months for its two largest social infrastructure projects and 70 months for its largest transport project.

The result; it looks like an England win, but its certainly not a mauling of Ireland.