This is a list of the complete squads for the 2009 Six Nations Championship, an annual rugby union tournament contested by the national rugby teams of England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland, and Wales. Each country was entitled to name a squad of 39 players to contest the championship. They could also invite additional players along prior to the start of the championship while the coach could call up replacement players if squad members suffered serious injury.
All caps are as of the start of the tournament, and do not include appearances made during the competition.
France named their final 23-man squad for the Six Nations on 28 January. Eight players from their training squad lost their places in the final 23, with only Biarritz number 8 Imanol Harinordoquy being brought in from outside the original 30.[9]
Ireland named their squad for the 2009 Six Nations on 21 January 2009. Included in the 39-man squad were seven uncapped players, as well as inside centreGordon D'Arcy, who had only returned in December from a broken arm picked up in the opening game of the 2008 Six Nations.[16]
Italy lost both of their specialist scrum-halves, Simon Picone and Pietro Travagli, for the entire Six Nations due to injury. Pablo Canavosio was called up but failed to recover from a knee injury in time for Italy's opener. This led head coach Nick Mallett to make a move he had been contemplating even before Canavosio's withdrawal โ shifting Mauro Bergamasco from flanker to scrum-half.[18]
After Bergamasco's poor performance at scrum-half in the opener against England, in which his mistakes directly led to three of England's five tries, Mallett recalled Paul Griffen to play scrum-half and moved Bergamasco back to his normal flanker position. Carlo Del Fava was also brought in as an experienced second row forward.[19]Leonardo Ghiraldini was called up after he recovered from injury but Fabio Ongaro was ruled out, so Franco Sbaraglini was also called up.[20] On 3 March, Mallett added several players to the squad. Coming in were Fabio Staibano, Simone Favaro, Kris Burton and Michele Sepe.[21] After returning from his suspension Andrea Masi picked up a back injury, Luciano Orquera was brought into the squad as cover.[22]
Scotland named a 33-man squad for the 2009 Six Nations on 20 January 2009, and included uncapped prop Geoff Cross and fly-half Ruaridh Jackson.[23] However, after injuries and illness hit the squad, a further five players were added to train on 30 January.[24] After injuries to Geoff Cross and the Allan Jacobsen, Moray Low was called into the main squad to provide cover for the final two games.[25] Following a return to fitness Rory Lamont was called up to the squad, but the game against Ireland came to soon for him.[26]