Scotland 6N lookahead

First topic message reminder :

 

Scotland 45 – Japan 10

Hardie, Bennett (2), Seymour, Russell

Scotland 39 – USA 16

Visser, Maitland, Nel, Scott, Weir

South Africa 34 – Scotland 16

Seymour

Samoa 33 – Scotland 36

Seymour, Hardie, Laidlaw

Australia 35 – Scotland 34

Horne, Seymour, Bennett


Tries this world cup:

Seymour – 4
Bennett – 3
Hardie – 2
Russell, Visser, Maitland, Nel, Scott, Weir, Laidlaw, Horne – 1


6 Nations fixtures:
Scotland V England
Wales V Scotland

Italy V Scotland

Scotland V France
Ireland V Scotland

Do not underestimate the power of his beard, a truly majestic beard like Jackson's is the mark of a talented player

yappysnap wrote:Do not underestimate the power of his beard, a truly majestic beard like Jackson's is the mark of a talented player

I think GLove might refute that

Well if we're going by beard's I'm going to have to throw my hat into the ring for selection!
https://vine.co/v/iWZVrEM2ZPq

GLove39 wrote:Well if we're going by beard's I'm going to have to throw my hat into the ring for selection!
https://vine.co/v/iWZVrEM2ZPq

 Keep them coming feller.

Can we see the GLove 12 Days of Christmas?

What have I just seen?!

George Carlin wrote:

GLove39 wrote:Well if we're going by beard's I'm going to have to throw my hat into the ring for selection!
https://vine.co/v/iWZVrEM2ZPq

 Keep them coming feller.

Can we see the GLove 12 Days of Christmas?

Cheers & ohhh, work permitting I like that idea!

yappysnap wrote:What have I just seen?!

the answer to our flyhalf problem?

yappysnap wrote:Do not underestimate the power of his beard, a truly majestic beard like Jackson's is the mark of a talented player

Agreed. Josh Strauss is another fine example. With beard he was a hard as nails all action number 8. Without beard he's become this callow non-entity of a player, usurped by Adam Ashe.

Cornell Du Preez is "with beard" this season, and he's feckin awesome.

The only chink in the armour for this theory is Sam Beard. You'd think he'd be awesome.

There's probably a point where you reach peak beard and after that it's a negative, sounds like Sam Beard may have reached that.

I think that Sam Beard peaked at Under 10s level.

George Carlin wrote:I think that Sam Beard peaked at Under 10s level.

That's right. ASBO was calling for him to play for the ABs back then I seem to recall.....

Sad news, having undergone surgery Gilchrist is going to miss the 6 Nations. Unluckiest player since Ross Rennie?

Blow for Scotland and certainly a huge blow for Edinburgh.

The Gray brothers are clear first choice but there is a big drop off after that, especially with Gilchrist injured.

Even though it is a blow, Swinson played well for Scotland during the world cup. Not the biggest but certainly mobile and physical.

With all due respect to Swinson, the fact that he is our 3rd choice lock really doesn’t demonstrate much strength in depth from a Scotland point of view. He would struggle to make the Glasgow 23 just now.

Hopefully Toolis can play a few games before the 6N and show some of last season’s form.

Agreed - we need Toolis to come back and play well. I'm not particularly comfortable with Swinson at lock for Scotland, albeit he isn't a bad player.

It is still fairly early days yet but it is a bit concerning to see Laidlaw dropped to the bench for the last few weeks and Denton still not being trusted with a start for Bath.

Maitland is only on the bench for London Irish and Jackson has managed to get himself injured (I'm assuming) so isn't playing for Wasps.

The latter two are less likely to be starters, but - rightly or wrongly - Laidlaw and Denton probably will be so hopefully they get regular runs in the starting XV as we approach the 6N.

On the plus side, Visser has pretty much started every game for 'quins and has scored a few tries!

To be honest it's probably no bad thing for Laidlaw and Denton to take it easy this month. Both played massive roles for Scotland at the World Cup and a few weeks on the bench will do no harm. There is absolutely no doubt that Laidlaw will captain Scotland for the 6 Nations and I suspect start every game (and finish most). Denton has competition for his number 8 jersey, but the lack of beard is affecting Strauss' game, Wilson is average so it's possibly Ashe emerging as a key challenger. I still think Denton will be top dog come the 6 Nations.

Some great finishes from Visser (albeit with some limp LI tackling)

http://sport.bt.com/video-01363814401986?videoid=4648581259001

Also, apparently Laidlaw turned the game when he came on for Gloucester - I suspect he won't stay on the bench for long.

Jackson was on the bench when Wasps got pasted by Exeter, I don't think he's injured, although after that performance he may well be back in the starting jersey soon enough.

In other news... ehh???
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/article-3334348/Thom-Evans-make-remarkable-return-rugby-Dubai-Sevens-five-years-Scotland-wing-s-near-death-neck-injury.html

NeilyBroon wrote:Jackson was on the bench when Wasps got pasted by Exeter, I don't think he's injured, although after that performance he may well be back in the starting jersey soon enough.

In other news... ehh???
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/article-3334348/Thom-Evans-make-remarkable-return-rugby-Dubai-Sevens-five-years-Scotland-wing-s-near-death-neck-injury.html

Old news Nelly - was discussed on here over a week ago!

He scored two tries in his first game, and scored a few more after that I think.

This wasn't the top level tournament, but the level below that.

Been working too hard this month obviously!

RDW_Scotland wrote:Some great finishes from Visser (albeit with some limp LI tackling)

http://sport.bt.com/video-01363814401986?videoid=4648581259001

Also, apparently Laidlaw turned the game when he came on for Gloucester - I suspect he won't stay on the bench for long.

All classic Visser tries. Good angles, good timing and good footwork. Pace a given obviously. Quins is a great club for him.

funnyExiledScot wrote:

RDW_Scotland wrote:Some great finishes from Visser (albeit with some limp LI tackling)

http://sport.bt.com/video-01363814401986?videoid=4648581259001

Also, apparently Laidlaw turned the game when he came on for Gloucester - I suspect he won't stay on the bench for long.

All classic Visser tries. Good angles, good timing and good footwork. Pace a given obviously. Quins is a great club for him.

Yep - I hope that he scores a bucketload this season so that some of the rather fickle Jeff fans here give him the respect that he deserves.

He might even learn to tackle by the end of this season.

The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

MacKnocked-on wrote:The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

Always rated Eadie. He just needs to stop tw@tting referees:
http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/BRISTOL-RUGBY-Mitch-Eadie-banned-weeks-following/story-27990442-detail/story.html

George Carlin wrote:

MacKnocked-on wrote:The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

Always rated Eadie. He just needs to stop tw@tting referees:
http://www.bristolpost.co.uk/BRISTOL-RUGBY-Mitch-Eadie-banned-weeks-following/story-27990442-detail/story.html

Another player for Joubert to run away from obviously

MacKnocked-on wrote:The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

Well I would suggest Edinburgh, obviously, but we already have Mike Coman plus rumours of Mike Penn returning, so we don't need them.....

funnyExiledScot wrote:

MacKnocked-on wrote:The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

Well I would suggest Edinburgh, obviously, but we already have Mike Coman plus rumours of Mike Penn returning, so we don't need them.....

What??!

Apparently Scotland are touring Japan next year, typical SRU strike while the iron is hot. They've just lost the coaching team that enabled them to beat South Africa but the memory is fresh enough to make it worthwhile when we beat them, we can put lots of stuff up about a successful tour and use it to sell tickets in the Autumn. In all seriousness though the fact, whether or not it is a necessity, we are the only tier one team to go to these nations is something we should be proud of especially when the Welsh and English are trying to shoehorn as many money spinners in as possible nonetheless when we played Japan five years ago in an uncapped warm-up did we see ourselves playing a full tour against them just half a decade later?

MacKnocked-on wrote:

funnyExiledScot wrote:

MacKnocked-on wrote:The move to London Irish looks a poor choice for Maitland as they look favourites for relegation currently, perhaps he and Cowan will be looking for moves at the end of the season to keep their international hopes alive. Hopefully Bristol can move up as Mitch Eadie is scoring a lot of tries and from what I've seen of him could be a good option at 8 or even 6.

Well I would suggest Edinburgh, obviously, but we already have Mike Coman plus rumours of Mike Penn returning, so we don't need them.....

What??!

I was joking. Sorry for any alarm caused!!

123456789 wrote:Apparently Scotland are touring Japan next year, typical SRU strike while the iron is hot. They've just lost the coaching team that enabled them to beat South Africa but the memory is fresh enough to make it worthwhile when we beat them, we can put lots of stuff up about a successful tour and use it to sell tickets in the Autumn. In all seriousness though the fact, whether or not it is a necessity, we are the only tier one team to go to these nations is something we should be proud of especially when the Welsh and English are trying to shoehorn as many money spinners in as possible nonetheless when we played Japan five years ago in an uncapped warm-up did we see ourselves playing a full tour against them just half a decade later?

On the tour note, there was meant to be a game against NZ after Japan. Was first agreed 5 years ago, but canned just the other week.
Wonder if they'll fill in that gap?

Where did you see that Glove?

From Rob Robertson, the Daily Mail journo on twitter.

November 23rd

Scotland rugby match away to New Zealand next June,first mentioned in 2010,cancelled "by mutual consent." Big opp to play world champs lost

December 7th

Scotland confirm two match away Test series v Japan on 18 and 25 June next year. Match v New Zealand first mooted 5 years ago not happening

Given the kiwis are playing a 3 match series against Wales, might have been another midweek game like Australia in Newcastle.
Not sure if this is a golden opportunity to beat NZ on their own patch gone a begging? Or a bullet dodged in the form of being humped by their 2nd XV?

Well, if there is a gap in the schedule, a game against Fiji would both look good and possibly act as another scouting mission to unearth some rough diamonds for polishing by Glasgow / Edinburgh.

After last year's summer tour shambles I'd like to avoid more long distance flights while trying to prepare for rugby games. It is a 10 hour flight from Japan to Fiji apparently and if it was a midweek game that would be a lot of travelling - we would probably even have to split the squad.

Also, I think we're doing another tour to the Pacific Islands in 2017.

Don't disagree about flights / preparation time. But that presumably means we were planning to take on the AB's with that sort of prep. Rather face Fiji with jetlag than go up against the Blackness!

The Japan - New Zealand flight time is worse at over 12 hours.

I suspect VC has put his foot down after the debacle of last year's tour and said that he doesn't want to drag the squad on another round the world trip!

Two tough games against Japan will still be a valuable experience for the squad - especially so far out from the next WC. There are plenty game to be played before then.

It is also a shame the games are so late in June - even if Glasgow (or Edinburgh!) make the final that is the end of May - 3 weeks before the first test. If they only make the semi's or don't make it at all then it could be 4 or 5 weeks added on to the season for these two games.

The last league game is 6th May so that is 7 weeks before the first test if either team finishes outside the top 4!

Two tests vs Japan is good in my opinion. Shame there couldn't be a barbarians match there somewhere, when was the last time Scotland played the baa baas just out of interest?

As the Six Nations seems to be starting up on the forum perhaps it's time for us to start fulfilling the second half of the title; for me there's no reason that this couldn't be one of our best Tournaments since Italy joined, now admittedly that's not particularly hard given Scott Johnson coached us to our second best one.
I'm completely unsure about the England game, in 2012 Lancaster played a blinder by dropping all the good, nasty English players and therefore taking away all the anger and underdog attitude key for Scotland to beat England, that and an inability to complete simple two on ones four years on and England are in exactly the same place and still aren't brilliant whereas we have some players who are quite good at rugby these days, you may say that if Eddie Jones can coach Japan to beat South Africa he can coach England to beat Scotland but ask yourself have South Africa ever beaten Japan? The answer if of course no, little Eddie did nothing remarkable he merely fulfilled expectations, as an indication for this match I suggest we take the Scotland vs Japan game more seriously than any other, of course we swept them aside and I would imagine a similar results in the England game.
1 down 4 to go.
Round 2 brings Wales, now they've done fairly well against us against for the last decade but as the old adage goes lightning doesn't strike nine times. They lost to Australia by 9 points we won by 2 (technically lost by 1 but we're all reading from the same page here) so we can expect to win by at least 11 points (it's worth noting that with regards to the Southern Hemisphere result theorem South Africa doesn't count due to time zone issues).
2 down 3 to go
Round 3 brings the significantly harder challenge of Italy, we all aware that Simone Favaro is keeping our fourth best openside Chris Fusaro out of the Glasgow side, that automatically makes him better than Chris Robshaw who isn't even a seven, Eddie Jones says he's a six and a half, we have one of them, his name is Kelly and apparently not needed. As a result you've got to say Italy will be a challenge, that said even with his excellent youth rugby pedigree Tommaso Allan is no Finn Russell, he's barely even Duncan Weir, I'd go as far as to say he's a poor man's Gregor Hunter. Why didn't he choose to play for Scotland? Did he fall or was he pushed? Doesn't matter, he's still crap.
3 down 2 to go.
Round 4 brings France, or as they're popularly known, the Italy B team. Less said about these guys the better, they're merely a worn down speed bump on Duncan Weir's road to eternal glory, he will walk all over them on his five minute token appearance at the end of a game so he can take the centre stage during the celebrations as the big forwards hug the smallest guy on the pitch to make themselves look even bigger. They have South Africans, we have better South Africans it's as simple as that, also to use the Southern Hemisphere result theorem we lost to New Zealand by a paltry 8 points, France by 49, that's a 41 point win, the grand slam is well and truly on.
4 down 1 to go.
Round 5 means that last and hopefully least we face Ireland, the biggest threat to us here is that Paul O'Connell comes out of retirement out of pity for his old friends. You all know the Southern Hemisphere results theorem by now (one word: Argentina). Furthermore Graeme Morrison beat these guys, Scott Johnson beat these guys, Vern and his new buddy Jason O'Halloran will be laughing at these guys, they might even let Max Evans play, perhaps even let Sean Lamont stroll his zimmer frame onto the pitch so he can justify taking part in 25 interviews prior to the tournament telling anyone who'd listen that Scotland can definitely, definitely win and that he'll never ever retire.
Grand slam champions.


If Vern picks the following team for the Calcutta game then I doubt I'll be able to contain myself:

1. Dickinson
2. Ford
3. Nel
4. Gray
5. Gray
6. Barclay
7. Hardie
8. Denton
9. Laidlaw
10. Russell
11. Seymour
12. Dunbar
13. Bennett
14. Visser
15. Hogg

16. Reid
17. Brown
18. Welsh
19. Swinson
20. Strauss
21. Hidalgo-Clyne
22. Horne
23. Maitland

That may well be the team, with the exception of JB, who won't get picked ahead of Cowan baring injury (probably more than 1!)

Cowan to be fair played well in the WC and has earned his place.

That is a pretty good team!

I wouldn't be too fussed if he picked Cowan but I feel with Barclay and Hardie would allow us to overwhelm England at the breakdown especially considering they don't have a particularly good out and out openside flanker.

For me:

15.    Hogg
14.    Seymour
13.    Bennett
12.    Dunbar
11.    Visser
10.    Russell
9.      Hidalgo-Clyne

8.      Ashe
7.      Watson
6.      Denton
5.      Gray (c)
4.      Gray
3.      Nel
2.      Ford
1.      Dickinson

16.    Brown
17.    Reid
18.    Welsh
19.    Toolis
20.    Strauss
21.    Laidlaw
22.    Scott
23.    Maitland

BigGee wrote:That may well be the team, with the exception of JB, who won't get picked ahead of Cowan baring injury (probably more than 1!)

Cowan to be fair played well in the WC and has earned his place.

That is a pretty good team!

Agree. For better or for worse the Scottish management have a problem with John Barclay and I don't see Cotter changing his mind.

Cowan will almost certainly start at 6, and I suspect Josh Strauss would be next in line.

I also think Cotter will pick Maitland at 14 rather than Visser. Visser is on great form but I think Cotter will go with the better allround game of Sean Maitland. If not, then Visser would play left wing rather than right wing, with Seymour on the right.

Our starting XV is the best we've had in 15 years. Dark horses anyone?

If Visser is playing he will be on the left wing with Seymour on the right.

Visser is a left winger - Seymour does both!

RDW_Scotland wrote:If Visser is playing he will be on the left wing with Seymour on the right.

Visser is a left winger - Seymour does both!

I just said that!

Don't tell me you don't read my posts thoroughly, hanging on my every word? I have a delicate ego.

funnyExiledScot wrote:

BigGee wrote:That may well be the team, with the exception of JB, who won't get picked ahead of Cowan baring injury (probably more than 1!)

Cowan to be fair played well in the WC and has earned his place.

That is a pretty good team!

Agree. For better or for worse the Scottish management have a problem with John Barclay and I don't see Cotter changing his mind.

Cowan will almost certainly start at 6, and I suspect Josh Strauss would be next in line.

I also think Cotter will pick Maitland at 14 rather than Visser. Visser is on great form but I think Cotter will go with the better allround game of Sean Maitland. If not, then Visser would play left wing rather than right wing, with Seymour on the right.

Our starting XV is the best we've had in 15 years. Dark horses anyone?

The Dark Horse rides again...

Straight into a ditch at the first hurdle...

I will never have high hopes for Scotland in a 6N – I have spent too much time (and money!) going to Murrayfield and leaving disappointed and angry over the years.

I keep harking on about it, but even 2 wins would be a significant achievement in Scotland’s 6N history. 3 would be utterly remarkable. 4 has never been done before.

RDW_Scotland wrote:I will never have high hopes for Scotland in a 6N – I have spent too much time (and money!) going to Murrayfield and leaving disappointed and angry over the years.

I keep harking on about it, but even 2 wins would be a significant achievement in Scotland’s 6N history.  3 would be utterly remarkable. 4 has never been done before.

We know that's what really hurts.

Anyway, when are you going to have that darn bridge fixed? It's taking ages.