Scotland RWC Warm-up Matches

First topic message reminder :

Previous RWC related nonsense:
https://www.606v2.com/t58234p1000-scotland-world-cup-look-ahead-and-squad

Game 1:

  
IRELAND v SCOTLAND
15 August 2015
KO: 17:00 local
Aviva Stadium, Dublin

Game 2:


ITALY v SCOTLAND
22 August 2015
KO: 15:00 local
Stadio Olimpico di Torino, Turin

Game 3:

  
SCOTLAND v ITALY
29 August 2015
KO: 15:15 local
Murrayfield Stadium, Edinburgh

Game 4:

 
FRANCE v SCOTLAND
05 September 2015
KO: 21:00 local
Stade de France, Saint-Denis

Forgot to say:
RDW + Greig Tonks sitting in a tree (etc)

The heart wants what the heart wants, GC.

George Carlin wrote:Forgot to say:
RDW + Greig Tonks sitting in a tree (etc)

You're just jealous.

jimbopip wrote:

p.s. This is mainly for GC who seems to like these things... we have all dreamed of hearing the Murrayfield crowd roar as we run, or walk menacingly, out the tunnel with the rest of the Scotland team but yesterday I stood facing Princess Daughter in her wedding dress waiting for the father-daughter dance to begin and as the first few bars of "My Girl" began all her girlfriends standing round the dancefloor went, "aaahh". You can keep your Murrayfield.

Who gets married on a Wednesday?? Was the father of the bride hoping that would mean lots of people not being able to make it, making the whole day cheaper for him?

Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

7. Still being unable to collect restarts properly. By far and away the most annoying aspect of Scottish rugby over the last few years. How hard can it be???

RDW_Scotland wrote:

jimbopip wrote:

p.s. This is mainly for GC who seems to like these things... we have all dreamed of hearing the Murrayfield crowd roar as we run, or walk menacingly, out the tunnel with the rest of the Scotland team but yesterday I stood facing Princess Daughter in her wedding dress waiting for the father-daughter dance to begin and as the first few bars of "My Girl" began all her girlfriends standing round the dancefloor went, "aaahh". You can keep your Murrayfield.

Who gets married on a Wednesday?? Was the father of the bride hoping that would mean lots of people not being able to make it, making the whole day cheaper for him?

No it means that the grooms family have until Monday to sober up, or a flying start to their weekend.

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

The good thing is we have the cure to some of those

1. Barclay in for Cowan
2. See 1
3. Nel
4. ....
5. Hogg, Seymour & Maitland need to work on this
6. Beard

[quote="funnyExiledScot"][quote="alive555"]Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers
7. Unable to collect restarts properly

UPDATED

Re: maul defence, in terms of power Jim Hamilton is actually excellent in this area. He's got those long arms which he used to reach over the maul and affect the ball carrier at the back, plus he weighs a ton so makes it difficult for the opposition to gain momentum. It's just a shame he isn't particularly good at anything else.

It's certainly something for the Gray brothers to focus on, and there's a technical aspect to it as well. Some teams are far more adept at managing to stop the maul at source, and bringing it down without incurring the wrath of the ref. Once the top teams get it set and moving it's almost impossible to stop, so it's really about challenging the lineout to stop at source, or sacking it before it has the chance to form.

Weegie Wizard wrote:

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

The good thing is we have the cure to some of those

1. Barclay in for Cowan
2. See 1
3. Nel
4. ....
5. Hogg, Seymour & Maitland need to work on this
6. Beard

Do you really think Barclay will win more turnovers than Cowan? I don't know what the stats were after that final round, but going into the last match of the Six Nations Cowan had more turnovers than any other player in the tournament. I know that I support London Irish and I know that he is a Kiwi, and additionally I will even admit that there are areas of his game where he could possibly offer a bit more, but the number of turnovers he wins isn't one of them.

(For the record I think he commits a few too many silly penalties and I'm not sure his carrying is as powerful as you would ideally want)

funnyExiledScot wrote:Re: maul defence, in terms of power Jim Hamilton is actually excellent in this area. He's got those long arms which he used to reach over the maul and affect the ball carrier at the back, plus he weighs a ton so makes it difficult for the opposition to gain momentum. It's just a shame he isn't particularly good at anything else.

It's certainly something for the Gray brothers to focus on, and there's a technical aspect to it as well. Some teams are far more adept at managing to stop the maul at source, and bringing it down without incurring the wrath of the ref. Once the top teams get it set and moving it's almost impossible to stop, so it's really about challenging the lineout to stop at source, or sacking it before it has the chance to form.

You would hope that Nathan Hines would be giving them a bit of an "education" here too.

Agree - Hines is another master in maul situations. Just makes a complete nuisance of himself.

Burger the stats from the 6N website are:

v France - 3 t/o won
v Wales - 0
v Italy - 2
v England - 3
v Ireland - 0

He won the most turnovers for the tournament as a whole (from Scotland) beating Alex Dunbar by 2. Obviously we would need to speculate how Barclay would have done in the same games but given how much ball the opposition teams had against us I think we should expect more from a 7.
This would be more acceptable is he wasnt giving away penalties all the time but with 7 he is the 2nd worst (after Geoff Cross)

All I know is that he won a lot of turnovers for you guys in the 6 Nations and he wins a hell of a lot for us at London Irish. I know that he isn't flavour of the week with a lot of you, but the media have generally been impressed by him. Having said that I do agree about the penalties. It was something that was a noticeably worse element of his game once he got called up by Scotland - almost as if he was trying to do too much every match.

I'm going to play devil's advocate. I don't have a problem with Cowan playing at 7. He can do a job there (despite his discipline issues). This said, I remember when John Barclay first came on the scene, he was a pretty damn good player. What he's lost in speed he's made up for in intelligent play recently.

I hope this isn't like the Beattie renaissance which lasted half a season (massive disappointment really), but I think Barclay adds the composure as well as grit, that Cowan doesn't quite have. I think if Cowan plays well in the warm-ups he could easily be our first choice 7 and I think he can and hopefully is learning a lot from Barclay. Hopefully he will use the competition as a chance to improve his game but I do prefer Barclay's style of play. Shame about Roddy Grant, one of the greatest potential caps that probably never will be now.

NeilyBroon wrote:I'm going to play devil's advocate. I don't have a problem with Cowan playing at 7. He can do a job there (despite his discipline issues). This said, I remember when John Barclay first came on the scene, he was a pretty damn good player. What he's lost in speed he's made up for in intelligent play recently.

I hope this isn't like the Beattie renaissance which lasted half a season (massive disappointment really), but I think Barclay adds the composure as well as grit, that Cowan doesn't quite have. I think if Cowan plays well in the warm-ups he could easily be our first choice 7 and I think he can and hopefully is learning a lot from Barclay. Hopefully he will use the competition as a chance to improve his game but I do prefer Barclay's style of play. Shame about Roddy Grant, one of the greatest potential caps that probably never will be now.

Barclays losing speed ? wheres it gone hes only 28 !!
Actually i havent seen him play for ages someone elaborate ....
In my books thats one of the most important attributes for an openside. You have to be first to the ball !
Like ross rennie had it, as does Watson. No idea about Hardie

alive555 wrote:

NeilyBroon wrote:I'm going to play devil's advocate. I don't have a problem with Cowan playing at 7. He can do a job there (despite his discipline issues). This said, I remember when John Barclay first came on the scene, he was a pretty damn good player. What he's lost in speed he's made up for in intelligent play recently.

I hope this isn't like the Beattie renaissance which lasted half a season (massive disappointment really), but I think Barclay adds the composure as well as grit, that Cowan doesn't quite have. I think if Cowan plays well in the warm-ups he could easily be our first choice 7 and I think he can and hopefully is learning a lot from Barclay. Hopefully he will use the competition as a chance to improve his game but I do prefer Barclay's style of play. Shame about Roddy Grant, one of the greatest potential caps that probably never will be now.

Barclays losing speed ? wheres it gone hes only 28 !!
Actually i havent seen him play for ages someone elaborate ....
In my books thats one of the most important attributes for an openside. You have to be first to the ball !
Like ross rennie had it, as does Watson. No idea about Hardie

It's gone into bulk, he's quite a bit bigger now, clearly been eating plenty of steak

And to answer your second point, he's been very good for Scarlets - captained them on multiple occasions, made a nuisance of himself, even scored a couple of tries. It's like when Scotland played Australia in the rain on tour. Basically he's at his best scrapping game and does it with a bit more subtlety than Cowan.

As someone who has played 7, albeit at a remedial level, I'll say my tuppence worth.

Most penalties 7's give away are deliberate. That's not to say a player approaches the breakdown saying, "I'll give a penalty away here. That'll be good" Hagrid Hamilton possibly, but no else. No, players tend to give away penalties when they can't influence play any other way. If I can get through the centre of the ruck and get my hands on the ball I'll do that all day long. It's only when I can't do what I want legitimately that I begin, quite deliberately and knowingly, to break the laws.

My concern about Cowan is that the step up to international rugby has been a step too far and he is resorting to giving away penalties because he can't influence play legitimately. Mind you the penalty he gave away at the first breakdown V Wales was shocking: he arrived at the breakdown slightly late, came in from the side and basically sat down on the tackled player. Now either he was testing boundaries with the referee, or the ruck was too fast for him and it was the only way he could influence it. Either way the result was Wales had an attacking lineout in our half and the ref had marked Cowan's card.

Barclay is way smarter than that.
Watson is more athletic.
The kiwi lad has been playing with some of the smartest cheats in the game.
So why do we need Cowan?

I think its clear that Cotter has got concerns over the abilities of all of our current options at 7. Why else would he ship in Blake and more recently Hardie? I don't think those two, in particular, were about increasingly the pool, they were strategic moves.

I don't think Cowan is a particularly bad player and if I'm honest, there are changes I would make before him (Sam H-C for Laidlaw).

Thing is, I can't see that Cowan does anything that Barclay can't do but there is much more to Barclay's game than Cowan's.
He carries more and he's a stronger tackler. He cheats more in the scrum (without getting caught). The Scarlets even use him as a lineout option. Also he seems to me as a senior member of the sqaud who is a potential captain. I don't think he will be given that role but one thing we have been screaming out for is more on field leaders and Barclay fits the bill but Cowan doesn't.

I don't think Cowan is a bad player at all, but there's no denying that he gave away too many penalties in the 6 Nations. Blake and Watson are different sorts of 7s, better link men, faster and more agile. Watson is actually a very handy ball carrier as well, a bit like Tom Toungs or Kevin Mealamu - low centre of gravity and quick off the mark. Always makes more yards ball in hand than you expect him to. Apparently tops the Edinburgh fitness tests as well.

If I had to take two 7s to the World Cup I'd take Barclay and Watson personally. Nice contrast in styles and both have had outstanding seasons.

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

8. Lack of a captain who has any pitch and ref presence

Riskysports wrote:

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

8. Lack of a captain who has any pitch and ref presence

Perhaps we could bring back Al Kellock as a captaincy coach, fine leader of men that he was......

funnyExiledScot wrote:

Riskysports wrote:

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

8. Lack of a captain who has any pitch and ref presence

Perhaps we could bring back Al Kellock as a captaincy coach, fine leader of men that he was......

He did LEAD to the league championship

funnyExiledScot wrote:I don't think Cowan is a bad player at all, but there's no denying that he gave away too many penalties in the 6 Nations. Blake and Watson are different sorts of 7s, better link men, faster and more agile. Watson is actually a very handy ball carrier as well, a bit like Tom Toungs or Kevin Mealamu - low centre of gravity and quick off the mark. Always makes more yards ball in hand than you expect him to. Apparently tops the Edinburgh fitness tests as well.

If I had to take two 7s to the World Cup I'd take Barclay and Watson personally. Nice contrast in styles and both have had outstanding seasons.

I do think everyone has been a bot harsh on Cowen in his FIRST YEAR of international rugby. Not sure many others have been given so little time to prove themselves able to play

Riskysports wrote:

funnyExiledScot wrote:I don't think Cowan is a bad player at all, but there's no denying that he gave away too many penalties in the 6 Nations. Blake and Watson are different sorts of 7s, better link men, faster and more agile. Watson is actually a very handy ball carrier as well, a bit like Tom Toungs or Kevin Mealamu - low centre of gravity and quick off the mark. Always makes more yards ball in hand than you expect him to. Apparently tops the Edinburgh fitness tests as well.

If I had to take two 7s to the World Cup I'd take Barclay and Watson personally. Nice contrast in styles and both have had outstanding seasons.

I do think everyone has been a bot harsh on Cowen in his FIRST YEAR of international rugby. Not sure many others have been given so little time to prove themselves able to play

Fes, you make a good point there.

Risky, Hugh McIlvanney always argues that club careers can decline gradually over seasons (look at Al Kellock or Dougie Hall) but international careers can end in the course of a game.

Riskysports wrote:

alive555 wrote:Actually in order of priority my list would be

1. Back row lack of turnovers
2. Back row too many penalties
3. Scrum mince
4. Maul defence non existent
5. Inability to defend high ball
6. Lack of ball carriers
7. 2 much Laidlaw

Thats my gripe 4 the day  

8. Lack of a captain who has any pitch and ref presence

UPDATED

Cowan is a very average club player who gains from plying his trade outside of Scotland, particularly England. I personally would have Fusaro above him at Glasgow and I imagine you'd have Watson ahead of him in an instance, it's funny really how our biggest qualm over Cowan is whether he's good enough although he's played the same amount of club rugby in Scotland as Hardie and less than Blake. I think Cowan is a very average player with very little to offer, anything he gains from being from New Zealand in my opinion he loses with that ridiculous haircut (unless you can walk on water and your Stepdad showed remarkable self restraint for an incredibly long time there is no need for hair like that), in fact it may be that getting fashion inspiration from the Stewart monarchs is grounds for Scottish qualification, you can't imagine Richie McCaw with a haircut like that. You can't have an inconspicuous, crafty seven with hair like his. John Barclay and even Hugh Blake have sensible hair and then Fusaro, Hardie and Watson are downright ugly bastards, that's how an openside is supposed to look at best inconspicuous and at worst downright ugly. Maybe Cotter, in his infinite baldness, is so perplexed by the wondrous nature of Cowan's lid that he imagines there's no end to Blair's power aside from that there is literally no viable reason to select him over Barclay. Cowan is older than Barclay, more inexperienced than Barclay (when Barclay almost single handedly defeated the World Champions Blair was playing for the mighty Cornish Pirates), and he's not got the same leadership ability as Barclay. I'd personally choose Barclay as captain, there's one man in the squad who was man on the match against the Springboks in a winning performance against the Boks and it wasn't Blair Cowan, he's not tainted by the dreadful six nations but has more international experience than all except maybe Hagrid and the endowed one and he's also been to two world cups with mixed success unlike Laidlaw, who has done very little in the last four years to merit his rise from Rory Lawson's boot cleaner to SRU golden boy.

I reckon our best bet of getting out the group is with the two following teams, although given the potential teams in the quarter final are much of a muchness and there's not much between them then as long as we win one of them it's not really important how we do in the other.


1. Dickinson 2. Ford 3. Nel 4. Gray 5. Gray 6. Strauss 7. Barclay (C) 8. Denton 9. Hidalgo-Clyne 10. Russell 11. Maitland 12. Dunbar (Scott if Dunbar is crocked) 13. Bennett 14. Seymour 15. Hogg

and the South Africa game with:

1. Dickinson 2. Ford 3. Nel 4. Gray 5. Gray 6. Harley 7. Watson 8. Barclay (the Boks feed on momentum, if we stop them at the source i.e the breakdown, obviously easier said than done but worth a go and Barclay has played 8 at international and club level with reasonable success, Watson is quick, and Harley is a gangly, ginger nuisance) 9. Cusiter (again a nuisance and an experienced one at that) 10. Russell 11. Maitland 12. Dunbar 13. Bennett 14. Seymour 15. Hogg

Post of the week, Numbers.

Spot on Numbers, the tonsorially challenged Cotter is bemused by the leonine mane of Cowan so makes him captain. But bear in mind his Kiwi heritage: if we're too critical, or unappreciative, he'll go into a haka-esque sulk about us disrespecting him.

Also , I like your first XV but I'd be tempted to go for Arthur Ashe rather than the Clairol sponsored show pony.

Pndering all the selection issues. Seems to me in a lot of cases Cotter will have to decide between the high risk or the conservative option most clearly seen at 9. Laidlaw. Very experienced, makes few mistakes, sometimes loses the spark and speed required or SHC. Fantastic player with great attacking flair. Inexperienced

Also in the centres - the solid and unspectacular or the great player coming back from injury and short on match fitness


Does he have the courage to go for the attacking high risk options? Is that the right thing to do? Can he use the warm up matches to decide and to try out the high risk players or does he use them to bring folk back to match fitness and to cement the partnerships he sees as first choice?

The Denton-Ashe debate could potentially go on for the next few years, Denton had the misfortune of coming through at Edinburgh at a time when their pack was about as individualistic as is possible apart from that European run and now they are a more cohesive unit he seems to be injured constantly, whereas Ashe came into a strong Glasgow pack and has to fight to stay there, he seems to have a higher work rate than Denton and received individual praise from Hansen which is no easy thing to achieve, having said that at his best Denton is an enormously talented player it's just we've only seen it once from what I remember  in a Scotland shirt and that was against England in 2012. I do wonder if that performance was due to the nature of the opposition, in all honesty we should have thrashed England that day, we made so many line breaks and had so much territory and possession but as will always be the case when you have a fly-half who can't make a backline move and a centre who can't pass it will never end well. That game strikes me as a watershed moment in this four year cycle even if it was the first game, England cleared out a team of Six Nations winners from the year before and suffered injuries to key players replaced them with rather poor imitations if memory serves me right, Scotland had a group of young, fresh confident players doing well in the league and Europe who Robinson played in the A team and played a very conservative and pretty poor team in the full side, we lost, England picked up momentum and the Lancaster revolution was kicked off, whereas that group of young players that should be Scotland's core have a handful of caps between them as a result of injuries and haven't picked up the experience they really ought to. Imagine if we'd kicked off this world cup cycle with a win against England at home, things could be so different for both teams, although it's funny how things work out Robinson destroyed England's last shred of invincibility by throwing Tait in against Henson too young which kickstarted Wales' rugby renaissance and then in his desire to not do the same to Scotland he regularly picked older players who'd neither form or track record to justify selection which in turn allowed an unfancied England team a smooth passageway into International rugby.

Anyone watch Wales take one up the blarney stone today? We will need a serious team out to be competitive against our paddy brethren.

Anyone care to hazard a guess at what Cotter will go for?

Is anyone other than Dunbar unfit?  I'd assume there's question marks over Gilchrist, Scott, Bennett and Maitland.

Would prefer Cotter experimented early and settled on a XV for the final game ahead of Japan.  Give the likes of McInally/Brown, Gilchrist, Barclay, Denton, Hidalgo-Clyne, Jackson, Vernon and Hoyland an early run to stake a claim and hold back the likes of Ford, Gray, Russell, Bennett, Seymour or Hogg.

Watching the Welsh today, really pleased we've had a really rugby based camp rather than a purely conditioning based one.

Probably worth mentioning that south Africa have lost all 3 games of the rugby championship! Piece of pish...

RDW_Scotland wrote:Probably worth mentioning that south Africa have lost all 3 games of the rugby championship! Piece of pish...

So it'll be the battle of the whitewashed on October 3rd

George Carlin wrote:Anyone watch Wales take one up the blarney stone today? We will need a serious team out to be competitive against our paddy brethren.

Wales looked sluggish and exhausted, they keep mentioning how it's the most brutal camp ever maybe it's too brutal, it reminds me of Scotland in 2007 where the team turned up bursting out their shirts and had barely touched a ball for three months. Now if there was one group of players who could ill afford to neglect skills training it was not the generation of Henderson, Morrison, Lamont, Dewey, Walker etc.

One thing today did show is that Australia are the favourites for Group A, the second place match will be a high pressure occasion and it depends who handles it better, you can't help but feel that the current Wales bunch who've nearly all won two or three six nations and a huge number of Lions. I'm not sure the current England side has had a single high pressure international game. That's why Glasgow and Edinburgh's performance in the play-offs and the Challenge cup could prove invaluable, Samoa squad haven't got the same high pressure experience and certainly not together as they're spread across several sides. South Africa on the other hand look dreadful but South Africa either win World Cups or bloody dreadful.

Scotland have to target SA after todays dissembling by the Argies!

Yesterday's matches threw up a few interesting points.

The Wallaby's scrum was pretty much on top of the AB's all game, either they have improved massively or the Blackness are not as good as some might say.

The Wallaby lineout was shocking: what wouldn't they give for a dartsman like WeePee or Mr Chinhook?

I think Richie McCaw is losing on points to Old Father Time. Apart from his try he was not great against the Boks, and was pretty ineffectual yesterday.

South Effrika couldn't win a raffle at the moment. They'll either spend the next six weeks suffering death by internal bickering or go on a masochistic SAS type training camp and come out like the Red Army defending Stalingrad. I just hope it's the former. Either way i see them taking on Samoa in an arm wrestle four days before they play us, so we should target them.

Oh yes, Ireland beat Wales B.This is what I expect most of the warm up matches to look like: one strongish side against one experimental side and no-one wanting to get injured. Rugby doesn't lend itself to "friendlies".

It will be interesting to see how Cotter and Schmidt see their selections for this next match...!

GLove39 wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:Probably worth mentioning that south Africa have lost all 3 games of the rugby championship! Piece of pish...

So it'll be the battle of the whitewashed on October 3rd

Absolutely. A global Wooden Spoon decider!

The way former Montpellier coach Mario Ledesma has turned around a perennially poor Aussie scrum shows how important a specialist coach can be for a national team.
The reverse process has taken place with Scotland's forwards for the last two seasons, with the welsh wizard or is that wan**r ? Jonathan Humphreys taking the core players from a hard edged Gllasgow pack and turning them into a powder puff embarrassment, being unable to recognise let alone stop a straightforward rolling maul.
Hopefully Nathan Hines has been taking most of the forward sessions whilst the Humph has had a wee lie down in a darkened room for the last 6 weeks or so!

sensisball wrote:The way former Montpellier coach Mario Ledesma has turned around a perennially poor Aussie scrum shows how important a specialist coach can be for a national team.
The reverse process has taken place with Scotland's forwards for the last two seasons, with the welsh wizard or is that wan**r ? Jonathan Humphreys taking the core players from a hard edged Gllasgow pack and turning them into a powder puff embarrassment, being unable to recognise let alone stop a straightforward rolling maul.
Hopefully Nathan Hines has been taking most of the forward sessions whilst the Humph has had a wee lie down in a darkened room for the last 6 weeks or so!

You don't think that's a Glasgow problem? The Edinburgh pack have gone the other way!

What core players would those be?? Jonny Gray and Adam Ashe?

The tombola rather renders the idea of there being a "core" to the Glasgow pack rather meaningless, but in any case I would have pointed to Jerry, Naka and Strauss as being as important to Glasgow last season as anyone else, and Humphrey's can't pick them.

You are right though in that the rolling maul defence has been at best naive, and the team selections in the back row haven't helped the breakdown. Against Ireland, the best breakdown team in the NH, we picked both Ashe and Denton to start in the back row. Whilst I'm not always an advocate of picking a side simply to negate the opposition, we were always going to be hammered at the breakdown by simply leaving Cowan on his own to compete for the ball. We should have had a player like Harley or Brown at 6 for that game, or even John Barclay.

Yup, the back row for Ireland never looked like it would work and it didnt. Giving Cotter the benefit of the doubt, perhaps he was seeing if Ashe could put in a shift at 6,if required? Given the answer was a definitive no i will be disappointed if he ends up there again.

25 man squad for the game vs Ireland.

Fowards;
Barclay
Blake
F Brown
Cowan
Cusack
Denton
Dell
Gilchrist
Ryan Grant
Hamilton
Harley
McInally
Reid
Welsh

Backs;
Fife
SHC
Horne
Jackson
Lamont
Pyrgos
Seymour
Tonks
Vernon
Visser
Weir