Gregor Townsend has packed his pack with Edinburgh players and his backline with Glasgow Warriors for Scotland’s Autumn opener against Samoa – but quoted some fairly authoritative precedents for his decisions.
“Cohesion” is the watchword for a team that Townsend admitted he had earmarked more than two weeks ago, and which he seems likely to run out for all the Autumn Tests, in the unlikely (impossible?) event that the Scots escape debilitating injuries in three games against Samoa, New Zealand and Australia.
Thus we have an entire back line, 9 to 15, of Glasgow Warriors players, and 15 in all in the matchday 23. In the pack, the front-row are all Edinburgh, and skipper John Barclay is the only starter who plays outside Scotland.
Darryl Marfo, reckoned to be fourth-choice loosehead at Edinburgh at the seasons’ start, is now first choice for Scotland, and will be the only new cap in the run-on team. George Turner, Jamie Bhatti and Chris Harris will likely get their first caps off the bench.
Townsend was bound to cap a debutant at loosehead because almost every other capped No 1 was injured – Alasdair Dickinson, Allan Dell, Gordon Reid and Rory Sutherland are all out,m with only Sutherland having an outside chance of playing this November.
The choice of debutants of Marfo over Glasgow’s Bhatti – himself an Academy player until the summer – in the main seems to have been made because of Townsend’s belief in the importance of “cohesion”.
“We feel it is very important,” said Townsend. “We found it beneficial on (the summer) tour, the Edinburgh front row started against Italy then the Glasgow trio against Australia and it just allows you to do more things than focus on brand new things.”
Players accustomed to each other in close quarters setpiece is an obvious point, but it also works across the team, he pointed out.
“It was one thing we kept coming back to as a coaching group, keeping club players together,” he continued. “We once played Ireland under Warren Gatland (in Dublin in 2000, when Ireland won 44-22, kick-starting their O’Driscoll/O’Connell golden era) and they had 13 Munster players. When Warren Gatland started with Wales he had 14 Ospreys in a XV who took on England.
“Joe Schmidt’s first Ireland team had 11 or 12 Leinster players. There are advantages, especially if it’s your first game, because these players don’t need much coaching.
“Tommy Seymour, Lee Jones and Stuart Hogg know what each other are going to do on a counter-attack. They bring their own systems, there are things they’ve brought to us.
“Let’s say there’s a tap penalty move they’ve worked at Glasgow, you can say ‘great idea. You guys all know what you’re doing there. Let’s do that.’
“It’s much better than us bringing in a move that is brand new to 15 players.”
In addition, the team was largely picked at the start of training camp two weeks ago. Making the switch from everyday club coaching to the more limited contact of the international game has clearly weighed on the head coach’s mind; he wanted the unit to train as much as possible together before they faced the Samoans.
Townsend has also made Scotland camp a much more open place than it ever was under his predecessors. The injured Greig Laidlaw has been here (maybe sensitive to talk of John Barclay skippering Scotland to the World Cup?) and involved in team meetings, and Kelly Brown has come in as contact coach, a role filled by Richie Gray under Vern Cotter. Chris Paterson has been taking kicking practice.
“It’s been good having Kelly around,” said Townsend. He’s starting his coaching career, doing a really good job with Saracens academy, he spent some time with Canada in the summer, and we thank Saracens for allowing him to work with us.
“Greig’s been really good in speaking to individuals. Players have had a lot of meetings themselves as well as us having coach-led meetings and to have someone who’s obviously a key leader for this team is great.
“The players have referred to the last Samoa game (the 36-33 nailbiter in the last World Cup) and obviously Greig was there as captain.
“We’re certainly aware of things like re-starts, which they were excellent at that day, and running from their own 22, which took the team by surprise. We’ve got to be alert for anything on Saturday.”
Maybe this inclusion of former players is because Townsend never got his Murrayfield farewell – he was unceremoniously axed after 82 caps by Matt Williams in 2004.
“I haven’t thought much about my time as a player at the stadium, but I remember standing up for the anthem, the beginnings of games,” he said. “I am not sure I will be thinking about that on Saturday it will be more about any patterns in the game, any help that the team need with messages or what I am going to say to them at half time.
“I think my last game here was Italy before the World Cup in 2003. I always want to go into coaching, but I never thought I’d be standing here today in charge of a team about to play at Murrayfield.”