For an ultimate team man who shuns the limelight and just gets on with his job, Geoff Cross’ very visible beard looks like a cry for attention.
However the idea behind the tight-head prop – called into action to start tomorrow’s test with Tonga at Kilmarnock – growing his enormous facial topiary is not to get noticed, nor that he has forgone his qualification as a doctor with a wish to become a lumberjack. He’s just grown it…because he could, with a little advice and infleunce from Scottish Rugby’s established big-beard man, Glasgow back-rower Josh Strauss.
“When I was at Glasgow for ten weeks last year I was talking to Josh about beards,” recalled Geoff. “He said if I was going to be a medic after rugby, I don’t think many people would be happy going into a GP practice to talk about their bad back and see a man with an enormous beard.
“So he suggested that if I was ever going to do it, now was the time, and that I should seize the opportunity.”
Seize it he has, despite the fact that his wife Helen – pregnant with their first child – is less than fond of it, to put it mildly. But if Geoff sets his mind to something…
“I see there’s a number of big beards in rugby now but it’s nothihng to do with that,” he said. “Now I’ve come this far I’d like to see what a years’ growth looks like, so that would mean until just after the Six Nations.
“I haven’t had any problems at airports, although my passport is clean shaven. One person did say “let’s see if we can find you in there” which was a nice quote.
“I know it’ll probably be gone by the time the baby comes, I wouldn’t want to scare the baby with the beard. There won’t be any big ceremonial shave, either, just my wife hanging over me asking why I didn’t do this a long time ago.”
It’s a rare Saturday opportunity for Geoff this week, as it’s usually Sundays when he’s called on for Euan Murray’s religious observance, but this time his perennial rival for the No 3 shirt has a thigh injury.
His philosophy has never changed in this regard.
“Selection is always an oppoirtunity to show why you should be picked, and it’s an opportunity for the coaches to see why you shouldn’t,” he said. “Vern’s been clear to me that if I want to stay in the squad moving forward there’s simple things he wants me to do, a little bit faster and a little bit more often, and he thinks I can do that.
“If I don’t do those things and training doesn’t solve it, selection will, I expect. That’s the kind of clarity you welcome from a coach.”
Geoff got just ten minutes against Tonga two years ago as a blood replacement, but he believes they are “an improved side since they last played us, and beat us.”
“We’re playing a more flexible structure of rugby now,” he added. “There’s a freedom there, but there’s also responsibility, and that’s taken communication and hard work.
“Test rugby’s a very dynamic place and we’re trying to make even more dynamic, which creates more opportunities, but you’ve got to have the structure to take those opportunities.”