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Six Nations still up for grabs, Ireland and England agree

By Padraic Halpin DUBLIN (Reuters) - After a game billed as a potential championship decider, the Ireland and England coaches insisted that the Six Nations was still very much up for grabs after Joe Schmidt's side prevailed on Sunday. Ireland took a major step towards retaining the title with a pulsating 19-9 victory over Stuart Lancaster's men to become the only side to win three games from three and get their supporters dreaming of a second grand slam in six years. However, there has been only one clean sweep since Wales, Ireland and France won grand slams in 2008, 2009 and 2010, with the championship decided on points difference in the last two seasons, a fact both coaches were quick to highlight. "Absolutely," Lancaster replied when asked if England could still win the title. "In every year, there are very few grand slam teams. The majority of years you end up with a team winning the championship who've lost one game along the way. "We've got two games at home, it's critical we get as much as we can out of those and Ireland have got two games away and Wales are obviously still in the hunt having won at the weekend. That'll be a big game now." Despite beating Ireland a year ago -- the last time Schmidt's side lost a game -- England went into the final match needing to rack up the points against Italy but came up short as Ireland got the victory they needed in Paris to seal the title. If Ireland lose to Wales or Scotland, the title may well be decided by points difference again and Schmidt said the 10-point win - effectively a 20-point swing head-to-head against England - was potentially really important. That gave Ireland a 15-point cushion over England in points difference but the Kiwi coach was not getting ahead of himself ahead of the March 14 trip to Cardiff and a potentially record- breaking 11th win in a row. "Control's fickle. It's nice to be in the position we're in without a doubt but grand slams don't happen that often and it's pretty hard to get them," Schmidt told a news conference. "And it's going to very hard in the Millennium (Stadium). Wales got themselves back into the championship, the last time they won the championship they lost their first game at home. They're no doubt eyeing up doing something similar this year." (Editing by Ed Osmond)