he two oldest players in this year’s Six Nations will lead out their teams on to the Principality Stadium pitch on Sunday afternoon without even a nod to the passing of the years. Age to them is like the number on the back of their jerseys, a matter of record, and they remain as driven as when they were first capped all those years ago in the 2000s. Alun Wyn Jones and Johnny Sexton are both 35, with the Ireland fly-half the senior by a couple of months. They have enjoyed grand slams and a winning Lions series but, at an age when most players have either gone into coaching, punditry or given up the sport for something else, their thirst for battle still rages. If there is a British & Irish Lions tour this summer, both are determined to be part of it. Sexton has the 2023 World Cup in his sights even though he will be 38 when the tournament starts in France. Jones, who on Sunday plays his first match since the end of the Autumn Nations Cup two months ago, is more circumspect about his future, although the Wales forwards coach, Jonathan Humphreys, believes what would be a fifth World Cup for the second-row is a realistic target. Sexton said recently of France 2023: “Do I think I can get there? I think I can, but at the age you are at, you’ve got to take it one game at a time. I’m still hungry and still love the game and competing. I don’t see any reason to stop, but it is not up to me when I end.” Both players benefit from being based in their home countries, with their appearances for their domestic sides, Leinster and the Ospreys, strictly rationed. “People like to put sell-by dates on things,” Jones has said, “but pulling on the Wales jersey still means a great deal to me.” He will be doing so for the 144th time this weekend, while Sexton will be winning his 96th cap for Ireland. They are part of the two oldest squads in this year’s tournament, Ireland having an average age of 27.5 and Wales 27.3. Between them, they have nine players aged 32 or above, nine more than England, France and Italy combined. “If you play well, you get selected,” says the Wales fly-half Dan Biggar, a youngster at 31. “You do not discard players because they have reached 30; there is no sell-by date. I have been around the Wales squad for a while and what we have now is a core of experience with some fresh-faced talent. It is important to have a good blend.” Jones led Wales to the grand slam in 2019 and then to the World Cup semi-finals in Japan. He was urged to continue playing by Wayne Pivac, who had succeeded Warren Gatland as Wales’s head coach after the New Zealander’s 12-year reign, in which Jones was a constant feature. What followed last year was like 2007, Jones’s first Six Nations campaign, but if anyone questioned his commitment to Pivac, he made it clear at the Six Nations launch last month that he backed the head coach’s attempt to coax Wales into playing with greater ambition. If he is to succeed, he will need Jones to stay right behind him. The second-row’s place in the side is not questioned by the Welsh rugby public, unlike Sexton’s in Ireland, where there were calls this month for him to be dropped from the side even though there is no one better. Age again, but he and Jones are exceptional exceptions, the leaders of two warrior teams who, when they eventually take their bow, will take some replacing.