Week of the Test
Scots eagerly await naming of side for first test, Jay Z signs exclusive partnership with Chris Dean/Fingers Piano Bar, spoon for the U20s and transfer roundup.
WELCOME: Six Degrees of Separation between Scottish rugby players and the A list is usually a tough sell. With the exception of Thom Evans and the Pussycat Dolls, and some changing room incursions from Gerard Butler, the highest echelons of Scottish rugby celebrity is Dougie Vipond and the remainder of Deacon Blue. Not anymore, though, and you can now draw a direct line between Manhattan and Murrayfield; Brooklyn and Bridgehaugh; Hollywood and Hughenden. How? How indeed. Read on my friends, all will become clear.
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LIONS WEATHER STORMERS: No less than six Scots were involved in the Lions comfortable 49-3 defeat of the Stormers on Saturday. Ali Price was once again the pick of the bunch, playing with a tempo and decisiveness that was totally lacking in rival Connor Murray’s outing versus South Africa ‘A’, while Hamish Watson put in yet another huge shift, topping the tackle count for the match and seemingly arriving first at every breakdown.
Sutherland recovered well after some early wobbles at scrum time, Hogg showed some nice touches in attack and Duhan was in typically rampaging form. It was also encouraging to see Zander Fagerson show just what he is capable of given his fairly quiet tour so far. Once again the Stormers provided underwhelming opposition, yet none of the Scots did anything to harm their test starting chances.
6 STARTERS? OR ZERO? Selection for the first test is absolutely brutal. We always knew of the quality that Gatland could call upon for the tour, but his job has been made even harder by the fact that almost every single player has taken their chances and performed extremely well so far. There have also been relatively few injuries to this point (with Finn sadly the greatest casualty). Ultimately there is a scenario where Scotland have 6 test starters, but sadly there is also one where we see zero.
Let us start with the optimistic scenario, where Sutherland, Watson, Price, Harris, Duhan and Hogg are all chosen in the run on side.
Sutherland has done well so far this tour, particularly at the scrummage where he has conceded the least penalties of the Lions looseheads, and was hooked after 50 minutes versus the Stormers, which is often a positive sign leading into the tests. Watson has proven beyond doubt he can cut it at the highest level, and could potentially combine with Curry to create a formidable pairing at 7 and 8. Price has simply outplayed his rival scrummies this tour, Harris is the best defensive 13 of the bunch, and Duhan provides a battering ram option that none of his teammates can rival. Stuart Hogg is, well, Stuart Hogg. It would be difficult to argue with any of these selections.
However, there are perhaps two factors that play against the Scots . Firstly, their lack of involvement (besides Chris Harris) against South Africa ‘A’, which in truth has been the only fixture so far that could hope to rival the intensity of the test matches. Watson would likely have thrived in the pressure cooker environment of that match, but we will never know, yet Tom Curry took his chance and showed his undoubted ability at the highest level. The same can be said for Sutherland versus Wyn Jones (and annoyingly, Mako Vunipola has come into a good patch of form in the last two matches) and Hogg versus Liam Williams.
The second factor is experience, namely that of big pressure matches at the highest level. Ultimately none of the Scots involved have played in a Lions test match. This might be the biggest stumbling block for Ali Price: it is only Connor Murray’s ostensibly greater ‘big match’ experience that would keep Price out of the side at the moment. Hogg might similarly suffer in this regard, with both Liam Williams and Anthony Watson featuring heavily in the 2017 test series.
Gatland and co will doubtless be looking to strike the right balance between reputation and form, and here’s hoping Toonie and Steve Tandy can provide more sway come selection than the Scots have historically enjoyed.
Let’s put our necks on the line here and predict there will be 4 Scots starting: Ali Price, Hamish Watson, Chris Harris and Stuart Hogg. Oh mama, please let this come true!
ROBMAC: we are delighted to continue our partnership with sponsor RobMac, who no doubt would have been delighted watching Hoggy and co in action on Saturday.
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ROCNATION: Testing the credibility of the English language to its limits this week, the United Rugby Championship announced a “revolutionary” partnership with RocNation, Jay Z’s entertainment company. A revolution in what, everyone asked as they watched the hype video that spliced images of Jonny Gray and DJ Khaled. Well, that remains amazingly unclear. There is a lot of talk about foundations - both of "clear purpose and identity” and “a strong notion of entertainment” but not a lot else. The one deliverable you can fish out of the marketing word soup is for a “Player Advisory Group” to share their views on the promotion and the marketing on the game. While in itself this is not necessarily a bad thing (or a necessary thing at all), we wouldn’t rank it as particularly important, and certainly not revolutionary, but here we are. URC did promise a championship like no other, and to be fair to them, in less than a month they have delivered a strategic alignment between Beyonce and Zebre Rugby Club.
In the interest of this revolutionary spirit, how about instead of Bruce Aitchison shouting the players name at Murrayfield next year we will have DJ Khaled shouting “ANOTHER ONE” after each score?
MAGNET ATTRACTED TO SCOTSTOUN: happy news this week for former Edinburgh man Murray ‘Magnet’ McCallum, after he secured a short-term deal with Glasgow Warriors (in typical SRU fashion, exactly how ‘short-term’ is open to interpretation). Magnet was let go from Edinburgh at the end of last season after an injury plagued few years, and spoke openly that his main aim is to get back to full fitness and start to challenge the likes of Pieretto and fellow Edinburgh convert Simon Berghan for the Glasgow tighthead jersey. It is easy to forget McCallum is just 25 years young, and his ability to cover both sides of the scrum is invaluable. Here’s hoping he can recapture the form that led to him being capped by Scotland during 2018.
DEADLINE DAY: the past weeks have seen a number of transfer rumours floating around social media (puts on best Jim White voice), mainly around more young South Africans making the pilgrimage to the promised land of BT Murrayfield. Watsonians Super 6 side have secured the signing of utility forward Kwagga van Niekerk, who was capped at under 20 level two years ago, and Scots-qualified flyhalf Marc Morrison, a recent star for the Lions under 20 side. Morrison’s recent highlights are included below - looks fairly handy.
It also looks as if former under 20 cap Nathan Macbeth is heading to Scotland, albeit his destination is unconfirmed.
U20s WOODEN SPOON: Scotland under 20 finished a disappointing Six Nations campaign with yet another defeat last week, going down 32-24 to their Welsh counterparts and completing a whitewash for Sean Lineen’s men. The young Scots showed plenty of fight, and the general improvement since that poor defeat to Italy has been encouraging. However, it is difficult to gloss over a wooden spoon ultimately.
While there have been calls in some quarters for a complete overhaul of our youth system, there are a few mitigating circumstances at play. Firstly, the Scots were shorn of some of their more experienced players, namely Rufus McLean, Jamie Dobie, Gregor Brown, Harry Paterson and Matt Currie, all of whom have had professional experience. This is also a particularly young intake, with over half eligible to play in next year’s competition. We should also remember that the under 20s were highly competitive just last year, defeating Wales away from home and only narrowly losing to both England and France.
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