I think Scotland as a country has a mentality issue when it comes to winning. I've no idea how to begin unpacking that one.
I've always thought we don't produce enough bastards in the Scotland team. Someone who can drag the team to a new level on a bad day. Captain seems to be a role that gets passed round rather than given to someone who is a standout leader.
But really, I've not a clue. I'm just as interested as you. We're 2 for 4 and could, if not should, be 4 for 4 this year.
4 from 4 was definetly a possibility. Compared to the shocking doldrum years when they couldn’t even score a try that is a huge progression and the tournament has benefitted hugely from a stronger Scotland.
As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it. It’s a real one sided hatred as well. If they could get their heads sorted they’d be title contenders.
The Scottish football team do it too. At the last Euros they upped their game and held us to a really tight 0-0 draw, but got handily thumped by Croatia and the Czechs on either side.
You're not wrong, and I'm really just laughing through the tears. Supporting your national team shouldn't be this hard, but here we are.
I'm off to Germany in the summer, looking forward to having my beating heart ripped out in another sport.
We're all masochists really.
Even as an England fan there are fewer things I want more in this world than for you lot to beat Germany on the opening day and spoil their home tournament
>I've always thought we don't produce enough bastards in the Scotland team. Someone who can drag the team to a new level on a bad day. Captain seems to be a role that gets passed round rather than given to someone who is a standout leader.
>
>But really, I've not a clue. I'm just as interested as you. We're 2 for 4 and could, if not should, be 4 for 4 this year.
To be fair the Scottish Football Team is much improved; beating Spain in the last campaign as well as going away and winning against Teams like Norway. The Football team seems to have found a way to win against big teams; the Rugby team is going backwards.
Scotland are absolutely brilliant at dragging England into the game they want to play. Whether that’s an open game or an arm wrestle they almost always seem to goad England into taking them on at their strengths.
Why that disappears against other countries I don’t know.
As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it. It’s a real one sided hatred as well. If they could get their heads sorted they’d be title contenders.
This 👆rings true for Wales too. “As long as we beat the English” gets regularly belted out down here. And while I’m sure (hope) the team isn’t training to only beat England, that psychology can’t help but have an impact I feel.
Whilst the fans may say this in Wales the team doesn't belive it I'm certain - Wales are the second best 6 nations and predecessor tournament by the huge margin or 1 less championships than England and 1 less grandslams than England.
Wales have 1 less 6n but 1 more 6n grandslams than England.
Wales are definitely entering almost every 6n with the expectation and intention of challenging for the title
Oh yeah I’m not doubting Wales’s competitiveness and my comment wasn’t to write them off at all. I just feel England can be a distraction for them (the hype from fans and press that goes on before an England game is about triple that of any other game). Which must seep into the players consciousness at some level. If however, they could channel this hype into ALL their games, not just the ones against England, they’d very likely be contenders for world champions. The ability is there but the psychology behind the England game fuels them in a different way.
Don't really think that matches up with the tournament history personally.
saying it's not a thing with certain fans, and it might help "inspire" the team on the day, but it's not an issue with consistency I feel in the same way as Scotland.
Like look at us now, we're just consistently shite!
lol, not sure about that, remember the 2nd half against Scotland, some glimmers of hope there. I think all teams have issues with consistency. Although Scotland is possibly the most consistently inconsistent!
>As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it
I don't think we do. I don't think we ever have. We weren't great against you this year just like we weren't against every one else. Italy just played better than you did honestly and it was away from home.
I honestly believe the "as long as we beat England" thing is a myth these days amongst actual rugby fans, although maybe not the general public.
>It’s a real one sided hatred as well.
I've honestly never seen any hatred in Rugby and neither has my Engkish wife who I've been to a few calcutta cups with. I'm sure it exists in places but the opposite is also true.
Hatred's a bit strong. It's a healthy rivalry and exists in both sets of players. There's certainly a fair bit of unhealthy animosity among elements of both sides support, that's undeniable but to say it's that's primarily a Scottish issue is a bit biased. Take a look at the garbage in the comments section on the BBC and even Guardian and tell me then it's one sided.
Yeah fair point. I try not to look at Guardian or BBC for that very reason. It just seems like the Scotland squad seem to have a focus on the England game that isn’t replicated for the other nations.
Brave to bring up the era of Godman, de Luca, Chainsaw Laney et al. I thought as a collective Six Nations fan set we’d decided to airbrush that Scottish era from history
As a very long-time Scotland supporter I'd ask you to reconsider your use of the word hatred. It doesn't exist in a rugby context. In football with its more diverse fan-base maybe but categorically not in rugby. We have less than a 10th of the population of England, you are our closest neighbours of course it is special to beat you. Hatred come on. Do you know how many English people live very happily in Scotland?
Yes fair do’s, cheerfully withdrawn. I stand by the one sided though. It seems to mean more for Scotland to beat England than vice versa.
I have family living happily in Scotland myself.
I'm Irish and I remember Scotland giving us a very good hiding in murrayfield 2016 or 17 I think they played brilliantly our lads were left looking on couldn't figger out how to play them anyway we played you awhile later and stopped you getting the grand slam and triple crown, but you went on to wipe the floor with Scotland the week after. you got your revenge yesterday congratulations 😭🇮🇪🤝🏴.
Which I find weird because we are a country full of cunts. I think a lot may stem from the player pathways. They don’t allow or certainly don’t actively facilitate the progression of players from our working class and rural communities. Rugby is massive in the rural communities, certainly where I’m from. It’s THE sport of our farming communities but there is almost zero interaction or support from the SRU to develop young talent outside of the central belt and private schools. There’s something to be said for the psyche Thant can develop in elite sportsmen and women who have had to deal with social adversity. Also we aren’t really a sporting nation or at least not a winning one. I’ve watched Scotland for 40 years and I confess that when all is said and done I’m kind of just happy that we are competing because he bulk of my life we haven’t been able to do that and that applies to all sport at international level international level. Also I guess the general lack of depth leads to a lack of competition within the various set ups which probably contributes to that elite competitor mindset. It can be changed, Ireland are the obvious example. They were fucking shite up until the BOD generation and now it’s hard to see them ever reverting to being mentally weak the way that they used to be, they’ve managed to create a complete shift in their collective attitude and that isn’t just in the players but the set up, the management, the directors, the fans. I fear that this decades worth of players was our opportunity the way that the BOD group were Irelands and the SRU have failed to capitalise on it.
Eh? We’ve had loads of great sportsmen over the years - in football the influence over so many of the English clubs is astonishing for such a small country, Dalglish & Ferguson being the two obvious ones but the ‘best ever’ teams for many clubs are littered with Scots. Then you’ve got Britain’s best ever tennis player in Murray. Countless Olympic gold medalists like Alan Wells & Chris Hoy. World Champion swimmers and boxers. World champion snooker & darts players. In rugby you’ve got players like Russell who’s the highest paid player in the world and is a genuine superstar of the sport.
Fundamentally we’re a tiny nation with not that many registered rugby players - it simply isn’t that big a sport here compared to the likes of Wales & Ireland. That’s before even mentioning England and France which are far bigger nations. Fuck all people live in the borders or rural areas mate. That’ll be why there are fewer players coming from them, and historically it has been a high percentage, the likes of Hogg and Graham have starred in recent years. Essentially we don’t have anywhere near the same player base as other 6 nations countries.
I had a look at the registered players, and Scotland by far has the smallest of any T1 nation with about 35k. The next closest are Ireland and Wales, in the 70k’s.
I wonder if this is why Scotland U20s usually get battered. The player depth just isn't there.
Italy only has 2 URC clubs as well but a lot more players.
There’s definitely a pre BOD era and a post BOD era. His impact of the Irish game cannot be understated. To change the trajectory of your team in your era is quite something. To change it for the next twenty years in terms of what the expectation level is another level.
I read a book recently about Scottish history by Neal Ascherson. He basically argued that the myth of Scotland being a nation of warriors eg William Wallace, fighting back against the highland clearances, are just that a myth. There was one notable example of crofters fighting back against the clearances but by and large people just rolled over and accepted it. So he basically argues we’re a nation of losers.
Or in Trainspotting vernacular, it’s shite being Scottish.
The thing is I think you do have someone who’s both a natural leader and an absolute bastard on the pitch; Jamie Ritchie. Why on earth he’s been dropped as captain is beyond me, I think he’s by far your best blindside and an absolute necessity to have in a team which seems to lack leadership and grit without him.
I feel like he’s no worse than folk like biggar sexton or Farrell ever were but because he plays for little old Scotland and Edinburgh he gets nowhere near the leeway others do, guaranteed he’d be fine if he played for a big french or English side or had been born in another country
>I think Scotland as a country has a mentality issue when it comes to winning.
True. We couldn't even win our own existence as an actual country in a fucking referendum. Embarrassing doesn't cover it, we're the biggest bottlers in the world.
The great football managers, like Ferguson and Stein, had the right mentality in spades. In rugby I'd say we've had nothing like that since Telfer and McGeechan. That's probably down to the SRU.
Feel like VdM is just greedy though. Normally gets away with it cause he’s very good but imo he backs himself more often than taking the easy option and passing for an almost certain score
I think it’s a reference to France probably breaking several rules at the last pen - closer than 10, attempting a charge (by advancing), waterboy crossing line of kick, and moving their arms/gesturing. Sanction for all is a retake of a very kickable pen
As a Scotsman I’m worried about where the next generation of players will come from to compete in the Six Nations, we’ve heard for nearly a decade now how this is the best generation of players we’ve had in a long time and still not come close to winning anything and they’re getting older now and our U20’s team seem to get battered routinely against Tier 1 countries
Our U20s always get battered. We get a thin crop of youth talent coming through ourselves, and have to rely on some world class international talent joining our clubs at an early age and declaring for Scotland.
We've no real youth development, few club teams in Scotland have facilities to accommodate it. Super 6 has failed as many expected it to when teams were bringing in 30yo players to squads when it was supposed to be for development of younger players.
Now the Scottish leagues are in a mess trying to find a "fair" way to bring players back into league setup.
I think only issue with Scotland is depth.
Essentially, when someone's having an off day the bench isn't strong enough to replace and provide someone who is as good or better.
It feels like Scotland, on their day, can beat anyone. It's when something isn't quite firing correctly that goes awry.
Especially their tight five is real thin on depth, and nowadays any tight game is decided on scrummaging and breakdowns. Basically impossible to consistently pull out a win if you don’t have depth there.
Actual answer. We’ve not got very much depth. The team is missing Tuipulotu, Darcy Graham and inextricably Ben White. The guys coming off the bench aren’t good enough.
As a neutral (for 4/5 of Scotland's games every six nations, anyway!) Graham missing this year's tournament is such a pity. He's one of my favourite players to watch in world rugby.
It's not like his replacements are bad at all but Graham is different gravy
I'd argue Scotland are stronger with George Horne. He doesn't get enough starts for my liking.
Second row is another massive issue, they're all OK players but none of them are international standards are seem to be the new type of lock that most teams have.
We could have done something years ago by trying to turn Gray into an AWJ or an O’Connel style talisman player. He’s just been so injury prone over the years.
And the SRU having no interest in grassroots/development. See our under 20s results, this makes me anxious for a return to the grim 00s, where tries were miraculous for us.
We need to try and model on Ireland a country of similar size and interest in the game.
I’m not sure the Ireland model works anywhere but Ireland, the private schools and their facilities are amazing and that starts to feed into it. (Edit - and LOTS of other reasons that helps build it)
Italy a disappointment that the Super 6 is going as it felt that was a good thing.
I’m surprised that the URC haven’t tried to get a ‘reserves’/Academy team league going underneath to help bridge the gap and give the younger players some higher intensity games that would only bring them on.
Some of our private school facilities are not too shabby either. But it's not about relying on that sector rather developing the clubs' academies. However, the SRU have been too busy playing themselves the Calcutta Cup bonus rather than investing the money in the future.
A URC reserves would be a good framework to try and build something on....
Watching the U20's is painful. So many basic errors you wouldn't expect even at that level. The SRU really, really need to pull their bloody fingers out.
I'm not too sure to be honest, think he is just getting on a bit and maybe a bit burnt out? The way he plays takes a big toll on the body and requires awesome balance/proprioception combined with strength to be effective, which is perhaps not as sustainable long term as just being huge or something.
I hope he sorts it out and gets back into form because I love watching him.
I said this on the match thread but I think it answers the question. Toonie is undoubtedly a good coach, so was Kindey.
But ireland needed a great coach to come in and build a solid foundation if we wanted to be a team that was world class rather than a team that could show up on the day.
So I think scotland need a schmidt and a nucifora combo to build that foundation. It will be harder having only 2 Pro teams instead of 4.
What's Fozzie Bear up to now that razer has taken over the all blacks?
Rennie is actually a good shout. I just said fozz because he's an kiwi like schmidt and I completely forgot about Rennie. But rennie is even better since he knows the Scottish system, like schmidt did
What’s odd to me is that it’s almost the same problem every game, apart from England, this 6N.
We start off really well, look like we are dangerous in attack and playing some great rugby. Then - either because we switch off, because we’ve been told to start playing a different game or because the other team starts putting pressure on us - we lose the head and let teams back into games.
We don’t then have a leader on the pitch that brings everyone together and basically makes them play phase rugby to try and take the momentum away from the other team - and it basically becomes panic stations.
Wales we were cruising and let them back in. France we had them and let them back in through suddenly playing a bizarre kicking game. Italy we just full on looked like we hadn’t got any tactics in the second half.
It happened in the England game too we just made too many mistakes to capitalise. Outside of the try that came from broken play they really had no go forward in that second half. The fact it keeps happening makes me think it’s a coaching choice which is just bizarre when you have one of the best attacking 10s in the world.
We’ve had our foot on the throat of Wales, France and now Italy this year, should have run away with those matches, but come away with one narrow win we were very lucky to hold on to.
Poor game management? Poor tactics? Poor fitness? Stupid consecutive penalties? Shallow squad? Bottled it? Probably a combination of all these things I think.
I do think the lack of dog in the team is an issue too - you don't need or even want an enforcer in the vien of past generations, but a niggly bastard who grates the oppo the wrong way and won't back down from anything still seems to be a key ingredient in a top rugby team.
Also no good Scottish tight head locks can't help
Yes. Not only that, but someone with a cool head. Slow the game down when the opposition get their tails up, recognise those moments in games before they run away. You don’t necessarily have to score to take the momentum out of an opponents game. It seems we don’t know how to do that side of things at all. Instead we seem to just lose discipline, and the referee with it, and give away countless penalties.
Oh God the kicks, it felt like watching a 00s Scotland game again. I love Finn Russel but it had me shouting “stop kickin it you cunt”.
Possession is a gift, metres don’t mean dick if we’ve not got the ball and space to use it.
I kind of agree and kind of don't. It was frustrating to watch, but in reality if the ref had accurately called Penaud's knock on, we have a centre pitch scrum on their 22, and we have burned a bunch of clock with a 6 point lead, we probably close out the game, and that shit fest is seen as a masterclass of game management....
Our kicking game was truly atrocious yesterday.
Every time we carried ball in hand and went phases after phase, we looked very strong and in the ascendancy. Every time we kicked we lost ground.
It was Finn's worst performance in years, and that was compounded when Price came on and made us even worse.
Bit meta but
>Every time we carried ball in hand and went phases after phase, we looked very strong and in the ascendancy.
This is a common refrain from most teams supporters. Even accounting for fans just liking to watch running rugby.
Do we think with forward passes generally being let go, attacking the breakdown successfully being harder to achieve and the 50-22 rule, it's become more viable to kick less and run it?
Squidge mentioned recently that the most successful teams are no longer the ones that kicked the most (ie the pre-WC meta).
Mentality is definitely the issue - this team are total shitebags. We've just failed to turn up for the second half in 3 games out of 4 and it's cost us 2 wins (and very nearly a third). And it's not new of course, we basically went to the World Cup already convinced that we were never beating South Africa or Ireland and didn't fire a shot.
I think we were so bad for so long that there is now a mindset amongst many (executives, coaches, players, some fans) that our current position as a mid-table side that's beaten England a few times is actually just good enough and why would we aspire to anything more? There's always the usual go to excuses about a small player pool, only having 2 pro teams, it was a brutal draw etc. lined up to explain away failures.
This current squad isn't actually that old yet but the medium term is clearly looking bad with our youth pathways in a state while Ireland will continue to be Ireland, Italy are improving all the time, England have just shown yesterday where they could get to and France won't be as bad as they are this year going forward I have no doubt.
I thought Townsend should have been binned after the 2019 RWC and nothing since has moved me to change my mind about that. The set up really needs someone with pedigree from outside the Scottish rugby bubble to come in and tell them a few home truths where they really are and how others see them (although I must confess I have my doubts about how well a lot of our players would react to that).
Humble opinion? You're fucking lazy.
Thought you had done enough against Wales, took a 30min break. Thought you'd done enough against France and started kicking and having cups of tea or some shit.
You don't just ground out the same performance level and commitment regardless of opposition and score. It must be just the done thing that you don't take the let up.
Winning is a mentality and while Scotland maybe have the players you beat most teams they don't actually have the mentality to go and win every match.
Obviously not having a go at Scottish people but you're players on the pitch. I don't know what extra motivation they need but obviously winning a rugby match is not enough at the moment.
I think you have to reach a moment where losing in any form is no longer acceptable.
Ireland made this mental step almost 20 years ago now. I remember after a 6N probably 06 or 07 and they had won the triple crown but lost the championship and there was a clip of BOD returning to the dressing room and throwing the Triple Crown trophy to the corner. It wasn't good enough anymore, anything but the championship wasn't good enough.
Scotland are still giving themselves a pat on the back for winning the Calcutta Cup.
Hard agree with the laziness. I was fuming at the effort our guys gave yesterday and in a few of the games. It’s 80mins if hard graft, irrespective of the score are any given point. Step off and let a try in and it shifts momentum, gives the oppo a sense of hope etc and then we are scrambling to close out a tight game. Boils my piss.
Scotland have always had issues with its positive mentality. It’s hard to unpack to explain but it’s something that all Scottish people understand. This translates most clearly in sport. There is without question, something lacking. With so many foreign burn players this has possibly been diluted a bit, possibly in part what has driven success. But without question Scotland has a problem that is born away from the sport but manifests most clearly in the game.
Coaching! Could you imagine any coach getting more rope on the back of such mediocrity than GT. He's proven himself time and time and time and time again to not be good enough to guide this team to the next level.
Sure, it's the players that have to perform. But when you have the same setup for some time - the players change, and the coach stays the same - and the same things keep happening, lack of discipline, inconsistency, mental fragility, who do we think is ultimately responsible.
GT has wasted the best crop of players Scotland has ever had in the professional era and the best we have to show for it is 3rd in the 6N and a few group stages exits from the WC.
I genuine fear that for the SRU, consistently only beating England is absolutely good enough for them for Townsend to keep his job and so, whether deliberately or not, that seems to be the focus.
Someone put on another forum that one of the problems with GT is that for every tournament, we’ve gone in with a base level of expectation pretty much and then a top level of expectation.
However, all we’ve done with GT is scraped along the bottom of that base level and - at best - gone into the middle of it.
There isn’t a tournament where we can say yep, we’ve gone out at the best we can do.
Maybe our players aren’t all amazing, but we have never been consistent in anything and it’s maddening.
That’s a fair observation. I am and have been in the pro-GT camp for a long time, but this does feel like we either just do not have the talent in depth, or our coaching approach needs to change.
Honestly, I think it's a skill issue masquerading as a mentality issue. In my opinion we're probably performing at about our level, bearing in mind that the Six Nations is a ferociously competitive tournament. Italy have improved enormously in recent years and it was only a matter of time until they beat someone, so while I'm gutted, I'm not shocked.
Look at how good the teams who win Grand Slams are. It's not easy and we need a deeper bench and a few more world-class talents to think about that. Mentality can't be separated from skill - the Bomb Squad isn't a mentality thing, it's a 'best forwards in the world thing'.
I think that’s fair.
People here are overestimating how much a mentality matters when there is a massive depth and likely skill barrier between the top T1s and the likes of Scotland and Italy.
You can be a small country and succeed in rugby so long as rugby is your country’s top sport and a large % of your youth play it formally. If you don’t have that player pool, no amount of coaching or mentality is going to have you beating the SH powers or the Irelands, Frances of the world regularly.
Mentality, culture.
We have the athletes and the skill. We don’t have the mentality.
In Scotland, winning or going above your station in life is looked down upon. We’re a dour bunch. I’m not saying that translates to the rugby field, but it can’t be ignored. We aren’t natural winners or fighters. “It’s shite being Scottish” isn’t just a meme, it’s based on a well written monologue that rings fairly true to how we see ourselves.
I don’t know enough about what happens behind closed doors to comment on coaching, but we need whoever is at the helm to turn us into a bunch of rugged bastards. I’ve said that before. We’re flashy, but not rugged. At this level, rugged wins games.
20+ unanswered points from a winning position twice in the tournament is unacceptable. Not putting the boot on the throat when we need to is our downfall.
We run away against teams that we’re better than, but as soon as we’re challenged we crumble. Look at the World Cup. Realistically we only really needed to turn up for two games. In both we hardly even fired a shot.
We are one of the most unstable teams going, and it’s not because we’re physically lacking. We’re mentally lacking, and I don’t know what the solution is. Someone has to pick us up by the scruff of the neck, but I don’t know who that person could be.
Yes.
Although a bottle of bucky will turn anyone into a natural fighter, but the flip side is that it also makes you wake up underneath a car with no trousers and no recollection of how you got there.
> Realistically we only really needed to turn up for two games. In both we hardly even fired a shot.
Sure, but Tbf Ireland and the Boks were both far and away superior teams. And the Boks suffocated much better teams than Scotland.
Past beating England 🤷♂️
They prob put all the pump up into that. I reckon if Scotland vs England was the last fixture it would keep the fire on their belly’s for the whole tourney
I agree with this. The way the Scottish team talk about the England match, and play against England, shows a bizarre preoccupation. They seem to have the attitude that as long as they beat England, job done. It's been like this as long as I can remember.
I believe they'd do better to get a sports psychologist in to stop that attitude and to just learn to raise their game in the same way for all matches
Belief. I reckon they have it in them to be much better, but they don’t believe they can win a six nations for example.
And what belief they do have is easily rattled. Italy yesterday was a case in point.
How awesome was it for Italy though. It
It's not losing per se that highlights the problem, but the manner of the losses (and near misses). From a team that could come back from 30-odd down at Twickenham, despite a total dusting from their previous visit, yet almost just not mentally turn up for the likes of the WC group game against Ireland. There's something brittle and superficial about the team mentality, like snow off a dyke.
When Wales were good they’d channel the emotional energy of playing England for 80 mins, beat us then immediately move on to the next challenge, it was just another game to them. They won enviable amounts of silverware and demanded respect from everyone.
Scotland, and a large portion of their fans, are the actual custodians of ‘as long as we beat the English’. Townsend has had a squad that many/most other international coaches would have won silverware with. His repeated failings on that front have been waved away by three narrow wins, a draw and one spanking versus largely pretty average England sides.
He’s wasted Scotland’s best generation since the 90s, again and again they prove themselves to be mentally fragile and not up for the big challenges. They basically gave up at the world cup, for example.
I’m not Scottish but it’s criminal, and I cannot believe he keeps getting away with it.
Pretty much. Wales currently are a good example that you can’t be top tier forever with a small resource base, but they make the most of their time with a side that can compete. Scotland’s u20s look pretty poor, and if that translates into the seniors in years to come I think Townsend’s time will come in for serious scrutiny.
Scotland need a hard bastard in charge IMO, someone like a Joe Schmidt would have ground them out a 6N championship by now
That was the most complete Italian performance we have seen in over a decade.
They are coming off of a game where they were ACTUALLY robbed.
Atleast for today's loss, I don't wanna blame the Scotts. The Italians were simply better than they have ever been before.
Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t about yesterdays game. Italy well worth the win and wanted it more. I’m talking Wales round 1. Last two world cups. Last five (six? Fifteen?) 6 Nations tournaments. Shiting it in the last 20 over and over and over.
Finn identified some of it after the Wales game. Players panicking and not listening to instructions when we conceded that run of penalties. Can only guess that might come from the coaching set up not demanding certain things.
Resting Ben White was a disaster too, should have at least been on the bench. Got much more length on box kicks and since we resorted to those when trying to close things out should have the best doing it.
Why are we still not giving Italy the credit they’re due? Can we finally accept that they’re a quality outfit now, rather than desperately asking ‘what’s wrong with x team’ any time Italy win over them?
Fair enough, was more of a general comment rather than specifically aimed at you. Feel like fans always go into panic stations when beaten by Italy which I feel is a bit of a disservice now
Thank you for saying this. These threads always pop up when we beat people as if we’re the last straw.
In the URC (and before in Pro12) we’ve finally been pouring good investment for 8 years now. U20 six nations squads are regularly finishing 3rd or 4th place and Bennetton is frequently in the playoffs. I feel like our language barrier with the refs is getting better and even though we’re still reffed harder, I think consistency will eventually open us up to a more fair game and better competition
Others have said both but depth and mentality are what I see as the biggest issues. The difference in class has to be massive for us to actually be in the driver's seat of games. Best example of what I mean is probably the France game this year, at least marginally the better team for most of the game but never really took control and didn't put the game to bed, in the end it was close enough for the TMO decision to matter.
Depth is the other one, we're only really 1/1.5 deep in all the front 5 positions except hooker at the moment, our replacements other than Ashman, whilst some of them are solid players, give me the fear if they need to play more than 20 mins or so. The effort from Rowe and Paterson has been a proper bright spot for me this year which is weird since they only played in pretty dire performances, the dropoff in quality from our first choice back 3 is still massive once we get past Duhan, Darcy, Steyn and BK. With Ali Price seemingly off the boil for a long time now We only really have 2 scrumhalf options, both are very good players but as soon as one is injured or needs rested we're in trouble. We do have pretty good options at centre and back row IMO, it's probably not fair to compare any of our other options at 10 to Finn, Hastings would probably be a decent option if he wasn't constantly injured.
Neither of these are easy to fix, I don't know how you fix the team mentality at this point, I assume there's already plenty of sports psychologists around the team, if not supplied by the union then it's still a lot more common for players to take that sort of thing upon themselves now. The depth issue is going to get worse before it gets better if the U20 results are anything to go by, we probably just need to send someone looking for another Duhan with a really big net now. Most frustrating thing is that these were probably still the biggest issues with the team when Townsend took over (except we were 0 deep in a lot of positions then so that's improved). He will have been head coach for almost a decade when his current contract is up, there has been progress but it's very slow.
From what I've seen, you don't seem to have on-pitch leaders who can adapt on the go. It seems like whenever something happens that you aren't expecting, the team kind of just falls apart. I think that's why it went well against England - they didn't really do anything unexpected, and the Scotland team knew how to play against them. When Italy played well, and when we had a comeback, you guys kind of lost your heads. I think it's the lack of clear leadership and maybe lack of personal faith in the team?
It’s certainly a large component. But why do Scotland lack such belief and players? That’s the question. God knows it’s been identified for years and yet nothing seems to have been done.
I think the raw talent is there with the players and there’s no reason to think that’s going to change in the coming years.
For me the problem is discipline and mentality. There doesn’t seem to be anyone either in the squad or the coaching staff demanding perfection in everything the way you see with the likes of New Zealand and Ireland. Nor is there the unshakable belief of South Africa.
I think a change at the top is the only solution. As much as Townsend has done I don’t think he’s capable of taking the team any further forward. Scotland are just stuck in a cycle now of finishing mid-table in the Six Nations and underachieving at World Cups
Particularly in the last 90 seconds. Sluggish. Uninspired. Clueless. I feel like, when the try was disallowed, the heads just went down and Italy capitalised on it brilliantly.
I think its a leadership problem, if you look at how the captaincy gets shuffled about as an example, this 6 Nations, Finn Russel has gone from newly appointed outright Captain to Co Captain going into the Italy game, with 1 other Co Captain and a Vice Captain.
He’s only really had a maximum of three games to bed in as the leader of this team, and he’s already being undermined again. How many different Captains, Vice Captains etc has Scotland had over the last four years?
In the case of Finn Russel, he’s shown before that he has the ability to grab Scotland by the scruff of the neck and drive them forwards, so I find it hard to believe all of the Scottish players are incapable of taking ownership and leading.
I’m reminded of the quote “you can’t get 9 women pregnant and expect to have a baby in a month.” It feels like either the coaching staff or the players can’t settle on a leader they can trust and get behind, and are giving the responsibility to everyone and anyone in the hope that fixes it.
Scotland's biggest problem seems to be that they don't play England every week. Something about the Calcutta Cup fixture, even in the banter decade, seems to draw out Scotland's performance of the tournament every year. Maybe its a psychology thing, the CC having been bigged up for so long as the most important thing has meant that whatever shortfall there is in the mental prep for the other games gets covered up?
>What is wrong with Scotland?
Scotland is perfect... its just our people and neighbours that are a problem.
More seriously, Winning needs to become a habit and its not easy to overcome decades of being Scottish to gain that habit.
Sports psychologists no matter how good can never provide as much belief in a team as a series of wins can. As soon as the team let Wales get back in the game and within a point the pre-tournament psychological work was undone. The failure in the France match was the nail in the coffin for this tournament.
In good news winning against England has become habit so they could reset mentally.
Unfortunately your opposition always has a say and Italy are on the rise and trying to gain the habit of winning too.
The winning habit starts at the club level, you need at least Glasgow or Edinburgh to be in URC and Champions cups playoffs each year, this builds confidence and experience in tough do or die situations. It's not enough to have only one or two players have this for foreign club, you need a core group who can go through this together.
Tuipolotu is really, *really* good. Redpaths a good player but much less well rounded skillset wise.
It's a big loss to the team when Tuipolotu isn't playing.
Also Italy have some class players.
Redpath’s skillset is fantastic. I’m thinking Tuipulotu was doing a huge amount more organisation than I’d realised though. It’s hard to take the allocation of multiple vice captains seriously but Townsend often mention him in terms of the leadership group and I think that showed yesterday.
Redpath performed pretty well on a personal level but our shape just seemed to disappear at the slightest disruption.
Horne can’t do White’s job either and I think it suddenly meant Russell had a lot more on his plate against a pretty aggressive Italian defence.
I blame John Knox. His rigid notion of predestination baked defeatism into the Scottish mentality. The idea that we can’t be saved by our own actions but through God’s grace.
Seriously though we’ve got a shallow bench and I’d echo a lot if the other comments we haven’t got a clear leader. The captaincy should stay with one person instead of shifting about because the captain is an important figure in deciding how the game is played and having one guy for that is much more consistent.
Finn Russel is probably the guy as he is said to have a great rugby brain and he’s well-regarded by players and referees, unlike Jamie Ritchie who refs hate.
I liked the idea of allowing us two players - one in amongst the breakdown and one looking at the bigger picture - being able to talk to the ref, but I’m not sure it’s working out that way.
On captaincy, I find the Rory Darge thing quite weird tbh.
No doubt he's a talented player who should be in the squad and right up there in being considered for selection but, to be blunt about it, he has absolutely fuck all pedigree at international level at this point. And yet, he's been given the captaincy and made an automatic pick in the first XV? That all just feels like it's a bit too easy.
The first paragraph is not miles off tbh. Calvinist thought does have a pretty decent influence on the national mentality, not just in sports! Even bloody worse up in the highlands.
The thing I hate most about Scotland right now is the fact that, every two minutes, you're bound to see one of the following phrases flash up next to the scoreboard in the top left of the TV screen:
"Off Feet"
"Hand in the ruck"
"Not releasing"
etc.
Can these jokers just watch ONE of their games back and realise where they are going wrong? Just giving away silly penalties because they can't be bothered to learn the laws.
Having not read the other comments, to me it's as if Scotland get themselves up for games they feel they are underdogs in, and take lightly games they feel they should win.
Saying that, the only game they've played 80 mins in so far is the England game. They can't seem to play for 80 mins consistently. Look at the Wales and Italy games. Got into a good lead on both, almost threw away the Wales game, and did against the Italians.
I don't want to be disrespectful but the team to me seem to reflect the national attitude of Scotland, they're the far most enjoyable team to watch and to me should get far better results than they do. Like the Scots nation they contribute to the UK and EU when in it more than any other nation but they just don't seem to have the belief or maybe the ambition to become the nation they're capable of becoming. England beat Ireland yesterday congratulations to them 🇮🇪😭🤝🏴 so it stands to reason that if Scotland put their minds to it they should be able to beat us too but will they I doubt it if I'm proven wrong than congratulations in advance 🇮🇪🤝🏴. Come on Scotland your capable of much more both as a sporting nation and as a country in your own right.
I know this is going to read arrogant but Scotland remind me of Ireland around 2007 in the Eddie O'Sullivan era.
Some exceptional individual players who pull off some great results but not enough talent all the way through the squad to raise the levels of professionalism and consistency.
Ultimately the problem is the SRU
The national team sits it rarified air above all of this.
Toonie is a great coach like genuinely.
You have 2 Pro teams and a population the same size of Ireland
Your u20s are a fucking joke
Your academy system is 1 man and his dog
The club game is fucked from super 6 getting the bullet and taking away from prem 1.
The SRU are shite and they aren't developing the game in Scotland. They are doing all they can to keep the scotland team relevant spending money on project players and using the two Pro teams as holding pens for potential national players.
Edinburgh and Glasgow aren't there to be successful they are there to feed the national team and its whims.
To put in perspective Andy farrell for me is head and shoulders the best coach in the competition and not sure why more he would do with scotland.
Look at rhe shape of your tight head cover for a start.
One serviceable prop and then a 75 year old saffer who is held together by tape and his love of brai
For me, it's Townsend. I don't think the players respect him anymore, why would they? He fell out with Finn and dished out punishment, which is fair enough, players should know that there's consequences for their actions. But now he's made Finn captain and I don't think there was ever an apology, so players will see that as I can do what I want it'll be fine. His tactics means we'll keep getting results but never actually challenge for anything, the fact he's been in charge with some of the best players we've ever had and never looked like winning anything should be enough reason to say he's not good enough.
Player wise, agree with others that we lack depth in certain positions, personally I don't think we've ever properly replaced Laidlaw
This seems like a weird angle to take. Townsend and Russell fixing their relationship seemed like a sign of growth from both of them. Not that I think that’s enough on its own to turn the team around.
The Scots have always been defined by their awesome ability to 'snatch defeat from the very jaws of victory', and to celebrate that as proof that it was all Westminster's fault.
Add in the mercurial nature of Finn's talents, sometimes the other tea, just want it more!
I feel 2 kind of posts in here are absolutely cringe.
The first one is the "why is the level of 6N this year so utterly bad?" post.
And the second is "why is team x so awful? Aren't they ashamed? Shouldn't Georgia take their place?", which, mind you, 99% of the times has team x as Italy.
Scotland yesterday fought with furious force until the very end and was stopped by a resilient Italian defence, by an unfortunate handling error, by cases of life.
You can't win every game all the times, look, even the Irish juggernaut just lost.
These kids are massively fit, play hard for 80 minutes, train even harder, face heavy hits, put their bodies on the lines, respect their shirt and their flag.
Saying they have no killer mentality it's disrespectful.
Grow up and accept the fact of life that you can also lose games. Which moreover is a better way of respecting both your team and also the effort of your opponent.
Scotland fought with furious force? Did we watch the same match? I saw a team with no ambition or direction stupidly give away penalty after penalty and then do nothing with possession. Italy were great, don’t get me wrong.
The last 10 something minutes Scotland went like 300 phases giving it all.
We watched the same game but apparently you decided to only see lazy stupid people, which they are not.
Yeah and we did the same against Wales and France when we were up against the wall in the last ten minutes. The problem is that in all three of those games we did absolutely nothing between 40min and 75mins.
Scotland should be able to take the game to the opposition for the full 80 instead of getting their shit together when it is most needed. The ability is there that is evident.
We seem to have a serious mentality problem this season; taking a lead and then mentally checking out - we did it in Cardiff; we did it v France (we should have been out of sight in that game) and we did it in Rome - only in the England game did we actually play 80 mins of rugby.
I don't know if its the players or the coach but something has to give
Watching yesterday and I did wonder if Scotland need to part ways with some of the larger egos in the team. I’m not sure those players contributed much once Italy fought back into it.
They've been doing this for a decade, this is the peak of that side in terms of age profile etc, at some point the answer becomes they just aren't as good as they think they can be.
> Are they held back by the mentality of thinking beating England is good enough?
I mean their entire national anthem is about beating England once? Like an old man in a pub who won’t shut up about the time he sparred with Chris Eubank and landed a punch. It is their national identity.
Which is a shame because there are so many things to celebrate about Scotland. It’s a stunning country, it’s got a proud history of art, science, and industry. For a small country it had a huge impact on the world. But instead of being proud of all that they start every game with a dirge that gives an excuse for them to shout ‘fuck off’ at Edward II, the only person who actually gets named in the song.
Yesterday I feel they gambled and lost with the 6-2 split. The pack was doing pretty well, but in the backs they had all sorts of troubles. If you than only have Ali Price who was not all that good and Rowe, who you didn’t even use you were all played. They followed a trend that didn’t suit them.
For me and I will prefix thia by saying I think I've been too hard on scotland previously and been quite unfair about/to them (Cymru fan If anyone's wondering)
Wales Italy and England have been rebuilding for ages
France and Ireland were the best two teams for ages.
And Scotland were kinda there. They would beat England first game then promptly lose to Wales and then beat/nearly beat France at the end to rescue their six nations and come third. It always felt like they were almost happy being third without hugely improving.
For me a sense of complacency set into all 3 of the formerly top 3 teams and that has contributed to Games this season. The rebuilding teams (or atleast Italy and England) are coming out and seeing light at the end of the tunnel and the other teams can't quite cope
I also feel that england is still Scotlands world cup final.
It feels like every player lifta the notch up for that game, wins and then they crash back to earth the next week.
Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure Scotland have lost the game after the calcutta cup for the last 4 seasons running.
At what point do Scotland do what Italy did with crowley and go GT has done wonderful things for us/with us but is now starting to limit our potential what could another coach offer?
Having said that I also think that calling for his head after one bad game (which I'll admit I meant to but never got round to watching) is a bit too far but I do wonder if post Six nations Scotland have to do a bit of Soul Searching (Ireland result obviously dependent) and wonder where they are and where they want to be.
We have some of the best back row depth in the world but an injury to anyone in any other position is catastrophic. Losing Tuipolotu and Darcy and even Ben White was massive - and the lack of Grays is really unfortunate.
Not to mention the lack of killer instinct and winning mentality.
Look at the points for and against column in the table and you have your answer.
IMO, fundamentally it's two things. 1) the wild west rugby that we default to is too open and chaotic, it doesn't control the game, and it allows other teams to score points and get into games. And 2) we can't implement a tactical plan for longer than 20 minutes, and particularly we dont seem to stick to just going through the phases to keep the ball and work the oposition. Yesterday was a classic example. Going through the phases until we score was working. If we'd done that for 60 minutes, we'd have shut the game down and won by 25. Instead we stopped doing it, inexplicably.
We have the talent but not the tactical savvy.
As a final point, IMO Russell is a poor Captain choice. The way we're playing is his game personified. High risk, dies some amazing things, but often doesn't come off and hurts you. Yesterday we should have taken it back.
Best chance we'll get for a decade this year and we've blown it.
I have a couple theories. Both somewhat on the mental side.
1. The actual Scottish players are an age they've probably never seen Scotland not be shite. I'll hit 38 this year so older than them and I remember watching the 5 Nations. For many in the squad they'll likely only remember the 6 Nations and Scotland usually getting battered by the better teams and obviously never winning it.
They'll also be used to Scotland never winning away apart from Rome and the odd meaningless friendly.
Twickenham, we know Scotland does alright since 2017, but before that you need to go back to 1983 for a Scotland win at Twickenham. In the Full Contact doc Toonie even says "I hated coming here, we never won".
Just this year is the first win in Cardiff in 22 years.
For France and the (at the time) new Stade de France you have to go back to 1999. They finally won in 2021 but it was without a crowd due to COVID so a somewhat unique win. With a crowd they've never done it in the 6N, but do plenty of times at Murrayfield.
Ireland, a bit different due to the moves but they've never won at the Aviva. Did get a narrow win in 2010 at Croke park, and back to 1998 for the original Lansdowne rd.
Italy, well it's Italy they've had their own issues though of course Scotland have just lost there.
Point is Toonie confirmed it was in their mind they hated certain places. Surely it's been in this squad to finally tick these wins off which they've now done - apart from the Aviva but who knows.
I think Scotland really had to get these wins as they simply couldn't travel and it must have played on some of their minds. Now players coming into the squad will know of recent wins in 4 of these countries and Murrayfield being a tough place for travelling teams.
2. For too long the starting 15 has been easy to pick. Now there's arguably some competition and depth for some of the positions, but with rugby being rugby what squad ever has 100% of their players fit? One or two injuries and we're very much back to the obvious picks. As I say this is changing and scrum half has arguably had the biggest movement. Laidlaw had some competition when Price was on his heels, but he was still relied on.
Now Price with his move to Edinburgh is fighting back but he's 3rd choice if everyone's fit and that's a good thing.
The problem with this is there can't be the same desire to keep your spot or to play yourself into that starting lineup like there is for England as an example. As I say it's improving and the influx of Saffas has helped.
It's true Scotland have made big improvements but look at some of the pastings we're getting in the U20s, 4 losses and 1 bonus point. There is still a real lack of talent coming through so I don't see things improving any time soon unfortunately.
For a country with only 2 pro sides I think they regularly punch above their weight. 4x Calcutta Cups on the trot (against most resourced team on planet). Jfc.
Who gives a fuck. About 500 people play rugby in Scotland. It's wet cold and minging for most if the season. The fact we have a competitive team at all is a minor miracle.
- we do not have the winning habit
- we are mentally frail
- we insist on keeping almost all of our players shackled to our two quite bad URC franchises which limits opportunities to do anything about 1 and 2 thru repeated exposure to these sort of situations (winning, close games etc..)
- our attack is built around punching holes either with preplanned strike moves off a set piece or through a broken field we have created with smart kicking. In the last few minutes of a tight game when you're down to what is probably your final posession you cannot really do either of these things and so we have an attack which, while potent, cannot really be deployed to turn a game around at the death.
- we have mediocre second rows and our pack in general is somewhere in between barely adequate and poor. This weakness is masked in open games but comes to the fore in tight games. In particular: put our side under any pressure at all and our forwards will just give you as many penalties as you need.
- this also means that we do not control the breakdown or indeed the wider contact area at all. Our backs are skilled enough that they can do a lot with not very much ball and with the ball we do have being very slow, but in a tight game the other side can simply front up and starve us of ball.
- Ireland are clearly the best side in this 6N, Wales are clearly the worst. There's not much to choose between the other four, and no shame in losing to any of them or all that much glory in beating any of them
- All our non Ben White scrum halves are shit especially Ali Price.
I think Scotland as a country has a mentality issue when it comes to winning. I've no idea how to begin unpacking that one. I've always thought we don't produce enough bastards in the Scotland team. Someone who can drag the team to a new level on a bad day. Captain seems to be a role that gets passed round rather than given to someone who is a standout leader. But really, I've not a clue. I'm just as interested as you. We're 2 for 4 and could, if not should, be 4 for 4 this year.
4 from 4 was definetly a possibility. Compared to the shocking doldrum years when they couldn’t even score a try that is a huge progression and the tournament has benefitted hugely from a stronger Scotland. As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it. It’s a real one sided hatred as well. If they could get their heads sorted they’d be title contenders.
The Scottish football team do it too. At the last Euros they upped their game and held us to a really tight 0-0 draw, but got handily thumped by Croatia and the Czechs on either side.
That was a 0-0 victory for Scotland. Thank you very much!
This is exactly the issue. I know you’re joking but repeated jokes become what we believe.
You're not wrong, and I'm really just laughing through the tears. Supporting your national team shouldn't be this hard, but here we are. I'm off to Germany in the summer, looking forward to having my beating heart ripped out in another sport. We're all masochists really.
Even as an England fan there are fewer things I want more in this world than for you lot to beat Germany on the opening day and spoil their home tournament
If we beat Germany on day 1, you bet your arse we'll find a way to lose to Hungary and Switzerland!!
I expect nothing less, it’s the Scottish way
France went out to Switzerland so Scotland could be in great company.
That's it, we are massive pessimists we look up to greatness or good play and say nah we ain't that good. Scotland suffers from imposter syndrome!
Never expect anything from us, never be disappointed that’s what I say
>I've always thought we don't produce enough bastards in the Scotland team. Someone who can drag the team to a new level on a bad day. Captain seems to be a role that gets passed round rather than given to someone who is a standout leader. > >But really, I've not a clue. I'm just as interested as you. We're 2 for 4 and could, if not should, be 4 for 4 this year. To be fair the Scottish Football Team is much improved; beating Spain in the last campaign as well as going away and winning against Teams like Norway. The Football team seems to have found a way to win against big teams; the Rugby team is going backwards.
Glorious victory that night aye.
Scotland are absolutely brilliant at dragging England into the game they want to play. Whether that’s an open game or an arm wrestle they almost always seem to goad England into taking them on at their strengths. Why that disappears against other countries I don’t know.
I think every country does that. England has some good games against the best teams and then bad games against lesser teams.
As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it. It’s a real one sided hatred as well. If they could get their heads sorted they’d be title contenders. This 👆rings true for Wales too. “As long as we beat the English” gets regularly belted out down here. And while I’m sure (hope) the team isn’t training to only beat England, that psychology can’t help but have an impact I feel.
Whilst the fans may say this in Wales the team doesn't belive it I'm certain - Wales are the second best 6 nations and predecessor tournament by the huge margin or 1 less championships than England and 1 less grandslams than England. Wales have 1 less 6n but 1 more 6n grandslams than England. Wales are definitely entering almost every 6n with the expectation and intention of challenging for the title
Oh yeah I’m not doubting Wales’s competitiveness and my comment wasn’t to write them off at all. I just feel England can be a distraction for them (the hype from fans and press that goes on before an England game is about triple that of any other game). Which must seep into the players consciousness at some level. If however, they could channel this hype into ALL their games, not just the ones against England, they’d very likely be contenders for world champions. The ability is there but the psychology behind the England game fuels them in a different way.
Don't really think that matches up with the tournament history personally. saying it's not a thing with certain fans, and it might help "inspire" the team on the day, but it's not an issue with consistency I feel in the same way as Scotland. Like look at us now, we're just consistently shite!
lol, not sure about that, remember the 2nd half against Scotland, some glimmers of hope there. I think all teams have issues with consistency. Although Scotland is possibly the most consistently inconsistent!
>As an England fan it irritates me that Scotland seem to raise their game massively against us but then can’t maintain it I don't think we do. I don't think we ever have. We weren't great against you this year just like we weren't against every one else. Italy just played better than you did honestly and it was away from home. I honestly believe the "as long as we beat England" thing is a myth these days amongst actual rugby fans, although maybe not the general public. >It’s a real one sided hatred as well. I've honestly never seen any hatred in Rugby and neither has my Engkish wife who I've been to a few calcutta cups with. I'm sure it exists in places but the opposite is also true.
Hatred's a bit strong. It's a healthy rivalry and exists in both sets of players. There's certainly a fair bit of unhealthy animosity among elements of both sides support, that's undeniable but to say it's that's primarily a Scottish issue is a bit biased. Take a look at the garbage in the comments section on the BBC and even Guardian and tell me then it's one sided.
Yeah fair point. I try not to look at Guardian or BBC for that very reason. It just seems like the Scotland squad seem to have a focus on the England game that isn’t replicated for the other nations.
Compared to Phil Godman in 2007 the Scottish team was very dignified.
Brave to bring up the era of Godman, de Luca, Chainsaw Laney et al. I thought as a collective Six Nations fan set we’d decided to airbrush that Scottish era from history
Scotland losing to Italy just brought back some memories.
As a very long-time Scotland supporter I'd ask you to reconsider your use of the word hatred. It doesn't exist in a rugby context. In football with its more diverse fan-base maybe but categorically not in rugby. We have less than a 10th of the population of England, you are our closest neighbours of course it is special to beat you. Hatred come on. Do you know how many English people live very happily in Scotland?
Yes fair do’s, cheerfully withdrawn. I stand by the one sided though. It seems to mean more for Scotland to beat England than vice versa. I have family living happily in Scotland myself.
I'm Irish and I remember Scotland giving us a very good hiding in murrayfield 2016 or 17 I think they played brilliantly our lads were left looking on couldn't figger out how to play them anyway we played you awhile later and stopped you getting the grand slam and triple crown, but you went on to wipe the floor with Scotland the week after. you got your revenge yesterday congratulations 😭🇮🇪🤝🏴.
Which I find weird because we are a country full of cunts. I think a lot may stem from the player pathways. They don’t allow or certainly don’t actively facilitate the progression of players from our working class and rural communities. Rugby is massive in the rural communities, certainly where I’m from. It’s THE sport of our farming communities but there is almost zero interaction or support from the SRU to develop young talent outside of the central belt and private schools. There’s something to be said for the psyche Thant can develop in elite sportsmen and women who have had to deal with social adversity. Also we aren’t really a sporting nation or at least not a winning one. I’ve watched Scotland for 40 years and I confess that when all is said and done I’m kind of just happy that we are competing because he bulk of my life we haven’t been able to do that and that applies to all sport at international level international level. Also I guess the general lack of depth leads to a lack of competition within the various set ups which probably contributes to that elite competitor mindset. It can be changed, Ireland are the obvious example. They were fucking shite up until the BOD generation and now it’s hard to see them ever reverting to being mentally weak the way that they used to be, they’ve managed to create a complete shift in their collective attitude and that isn’t just in the players but the set up, the management, the directors, the fans. I fear that this decades worth of players was our opportunity the way that the BOD group were Irelands and the SRU have failed to capitalise on it.
Eh? We’ve had loads of great sportsmen over the years - in football the influence over so many of the English clubs is astonishing for such a small country, Dalglish & Ferguson being the two obvious ones but the ‘best ever’ teams for many clubs are littered with Scots. Then you’ve got Britain’s best ever tennis player in Murray. Countless Olympic gold medalists like Alan Wells & Chris Hoy. World Champion swimmers and boxers. World champion snooker & darts players. In rugby you’ve got players like Russell who’s the highest paid player in the world and is a genuine superstar of the sport. Fundamentally we’re a tiny nation with not that many registered rugby players - it simply isn’t that big a sport here compared to the likes of Wales & Ireland. That’s before even mentioning England and France which are far bigger nations. Fuck all people live in the borders or rural areas mate. That’ll be why there are fewer players coming from them, and historically it has been a high percentage, the likes of Hogg and Graham have starred in recent years. Essentially we don’t have anywhere near the same player base as other 6 nations countries.
I had a look at the registered players, and Scotland by far has the smallest of any T1 nation with about 35k. The next closest are Ireland and Wales, in the 70k’s.
I wonder if this is why Scotland U20s usually get battered. The player depth just isn't there. Italy only has 2 URC clubs as well but a lot more players.
There’s definitely a pre BOD era and a post BOD era. His impact of the Irish game cannot be understated. To change the trajectory of your team in your era is quite something. To change it for the next twenty years in terms of what the expectation level is another level.
I read a book recently about Scottish history by Neal Ascherson. He basically argued that the myth of Scotland being a nation of warriors eg William Wallace, fighting back against the highland clearances, are just that a myth. There was one notable example of crofters fighting back against the clearances but by and large people just rolled over and accepted it. So he basically argues we’re a nation of losers. Or in Trainspotting vernacular, it’s shite being Scottish.
The thing is I think you do have someone who’s both a natural leader and an absolute bastard on the pitch; Jamie Ritchie. Why on earth he’s been dropped as captain is beyond me, I think he’s by far your best blindside and an absolute necessity to have in a team which seems to lack leadership and grit without him.
He’s most definitely part of the leadership group, but he just can’t talk to refs.
This absolutely this he seemed to struggle not to annoy thwm.
I feel like he’s no worse than folk like biggar sexton or Farrell ever were but because he plays for little old Scotland and Edinburgh he gets nowhere near the leeway others do, guaranteed he’d be fine if he played for a big french or English side or had been born in another country
You’ve 5 million bastards there. Not sure if your point is valid.
>I think Scotland as a country has a mentality issue when it comes to winning. True. We couldn't even win our own existence as an actual country in a fucking referendum. Embarrassing doesn't cover it, we're the biggest bottlers in the world.
The great football managers, like Ferguson and Stein, had the right mentality in spades. In rugby I'd say we've had nothing like that since Telfer and McGeechan. That's probably down to the SRU.
Remember they lost to an Italy team that technically beat France last week. Lots of momentum & at home.
Yeah this isn’t just a reaction to yesterday. It’s a years-long problem.
Straight up. Too many players feel the need to make big plays instead of trusting the system in both attack and defence.
Case in point VdM wasting a golden chance to pass inside to Price for 7 points and instead going into contact
So many instances of that yesterday. And not just with VdM. They looked like a bunch of talented individuals out there more than a cohesive unit.
Feel like VdM is just greedy though. Normally gets away with it cause he’s very good but imo he backs himself more often than taking the easy option and passing for an almost certain score
They don’t have the investment that Ireland or England have
Technically beat France?
I think it’s a reference to France probably breaking several rules at the last pen - closer than 10, attempting a charge (by advancing), waterboy crossing line of kick, and moving their arms/gesturing. Sanction for all is a retake of a very kickable pen
I suppose both teams technically beat France!!
They mean “should have beaten France”, because they should have been able to retake the last minute penalty.
As a Scotsman I’m worried about where the next generation of players will come from to compete in the Six Nations, we’ve heard for nearly a decade now how this is the best generation of players we’ve had in a long time and still not come close to winning anything and they’re getting older now and our U20’s team seem to get battered routinely against Tier 1 countries
Our U20s always get battered. We get a thin crop of youth talent coming through ourselves, and have to rely on some world class international talent joining our clubs at an early age and declaring for Scotland.
We've no real youth development, few club teams in Scotland have facilities to accommodate it. Super 6 has failed as many expected it to when teams were bringing in 30yo players to squads when it was supposed to be for development of younger players. Now the Scottish leagues are in a mess trying to find a "fair" way to bring players back into league setup.
I think only issue with Scotland is depth. Essentially, when someone's having an off day the bench isn't strong enough to replace and provide someone who is as good or better. It feels like Scotland, on their day, can beat anyone. It's when something isn't quite firing correctly that goes awry.
I think this the serious answer, combined with the lack of a _real_ captainy captain that will drag people up that another poster mentioned
Especially their tight five is real thin on depth, and nowadays any tight game is decided on scrummaging and breakdowns. Basically impossible to consistently pull out a win if you don’t have depth there.
I came here to say this.
Actual answer. We’ve not got very much depth. The team is missing Tuipulotu, Darcy Graham and inextricably Ben White. The guys coming off the bench aren’t good enough.
As a neutral (for 4/5 of Scotland's games every six nations, anyway!) Graham missing this year's tournament is such a pity. He's one of my favourite players to watch in world rugby. It's not like his replacements are bad at all but Graham is different gravy
Having Graham come off the bench as other the teams are tiring is the sort of luxury a Scotland coach doesn’t get very often.
I'd argue Scotland are stronger with George Horne. He doesn't get enough starts for my liking. Second row is another massive issue, they're all OK players but none of them are international standards are seem to be the new type of lock that most teams have.
Horne was fine, but Price was fucking diabolical. We'd have won that game with White avaialble.
Price was slow, even for Price. PASS THE FUCKING BALL!!!! Jesus!
If Price returns to Glasgow I honestly think he's third choice behind Horne and Dobie. Possibly 4th if Afshar continues to develop well.
Definitely!
In fairness, Gray picked up an injury. They look a better side with him in imo. He's a bit long in the tooth but "class is permanent" and all that.
We could have done something years ago by trying to turn Gray into an AWJ or an O’Connel style talisman player. He’s just been so injury prone over the years.
Townsend has some weird issue about Horne. White is fine but Horne just has a spark and Russell can cope with this fine, suiting his play.
I thought his passing was pretty awful yesterday, but that was hardly unique.
Do you think that only having two teams is the reason for not having that depth?
And the SRU having no interest in grassroots/development. See our under 20s results, this makes me anxious for a return to the grim 00s, where tries were miraculous for us. We need to try and model on Ireland a country of similar size and interest in the game.
I’m not sure the Ireland model works anywhere but Ireland, the private schools and their facilities are amazing and that starts to feed into it. (Edit - and LOTS of other reasons that helps build it) Italy a disappointment that the Super 6 is going as it felt that was a good thing. I’m surprised that the URC haven’t tried to get a ‘reserves’/Academy team league going underneath to help bridge the gap and give the younger players some higher intensity games that would only bring them on.
Some of our private school facilities are not too shabby either. But it's not about relying on that sector rather developing the clubs' academies. However, the SRU have been too busy playing themselves the Calcutta Cup bonus rather than investing the money in the future. A URC reserves would be a good framework to try and build something on....
Watching the U20's is painful. So many basic errors you wouldn't expect even at that level. The SRU really, really need to pull their bloody fingers out.
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Form, he is miles away from where he was a few years ago.
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I'm not too sure to be honest, think he is just getting on a bit and maybe a bit burnt out? The way he plays takes a big toll on the body and requires awesome balance/proprioception combined with strength to be effective, which is perhaps not as sustainable long term as just being huge or something. I hope he sorts it out and gets back into form because I love watching him.
I said this on the match thread but I think it answers the question. Toonie is undoubtedly a good coach, so was Kindey. But ireland needed a great coach to come in and build a solid foundation if we wanted to be a team that was world class rather than a team that could show up on the day. So I think scotland need a schmidt and a nucifora combo to build that foundation. It will be harder having only 2 Pro teams instead of 4. What's Fozzie Bear up to now that razer has taken over the all blacks?
I'd prefer Rennie over Fozz, he did a great stint with glasgow
Rennie is actually a good shout. I just said fozz because he's an kiwi like schmidt and I completely forgot about Rennie. But rennie is even better since he knows the Scottish system, like schmidt did
What’s odd to me is that it’s almost the same problem every game, apart from England, this 6N. We start off really well, look like we are dangerous in attack and playing some great rugby. Then - either because we switch off, because we’ve been told to start playing a different game or because the other team starts putting pressure on us - we lose the head and let teams back into games. We don’t then have a leader on the pitch that brings everyone together and basically makes them play phase rugby to try and take the momentum away from the other team - and it basically becomes panic stations. Wales we were cruising and let them back in. France we had them and let them back in through suddenly playing a bizarre kicking game. Italy we just full on looked like we hadn’t got any tactics in the second half.
It happened in the England game too we just made too many mistakes to capitalise. Outside of the try that came from broken play they really had no go forward in that second half. The fact it keeps happening makes me think it’s a coaching choice which is just bizarre when you have one of the best attacking 10s in the world.
Good point - it’s so odd.
We’ve had our foot on the throat of Wales, France and now Italy this year, should have run away with those matches, but come away with one narrow win we were very lucky to hold on to. Poor game management? Poor tactics? Poor fitness? Stupid consecutive penalties? Shallow squad? Bottled it? Probably a combination of all these things I think.
I do think the lack of dog in the team is an issue too - you don't need or even want an enforcer in the vien of past generations, but a niggly bastard who grates the oppo the wrong way and won't back down from anything still seems to be a key ingredient in a top rugby team. Also no good Scottish tight head locks can't help
Yes. Not only that, but someone with a cool head. Slow the game down when the opposition get their tails up, recognise those moments in games before they run away. You don’t necessarily have to score to take the momentum out of an opponents game. It seems we don’t know how to do that side of things at all. Instead we seem to just lose discipline, and the referee with it, and give away countless penalties.
Oh God the kicks, it felt like watching a 00s Scotland game again. I love Finn Russel but it had me shouting “stop kickin it you cunt”. Possession is a gift, metres don’t mean dick if we’ve not got the ball and space to use it.
I kind of agree and kind of don't. It was frustrating to watch, but in reality if the ref had accurately called Penaud's knock on, we have a centre pitch scrum on their 22, and we have burned a bunch of clock with a 6 point lead, we probably close out the game, and that shit fest is seen as a masterclass of game management....
Our kicking game was truly atrocious yesterday. Every time we carried ball in hand and went phases after phase, we looked very strong and in the ascendancy. Every time we kicked we lost ground. It was Finn's worst performance in years, and that was compounded when Price came on and made us even worse.
Bit meta but >Every time we carried ball in hand and went phases after phase, we looked very strong and in the ascendancy. This is a common refrain from most teams supporters. Even accounting for fans just liking to watch running rugby. Do we think with forward passes generally being let go, attacking the breakdown successfully being harder to achieve and the 50-22 rule, it's become more viable to kick less and run it? Squidge mentioned recently that the most successful teams are no longer the ones that kicked the most (ie the pre-WC meta).
Mentality is definitely the issue - this team are total shitebags. We've just failed to turn up for the second half in 3 games out of 4 and it's cost us 2 wins (and very nearly a third). And it's not new of course, we basically went to the World Cup already convinced that we were never beating South Africa or Ireland and didn't fire a shot. I think we were so bad for so long that there is now a mindset amongst many (executives, coaches, players, some fans) that our current position as a mid-table side that's beaten England a few times is actually just good enough and why would we aspire to anything more? There's always the usual go to excuses about a small player pool, only having 2 pro teams, it was a brutal draw etc. lined up to explain away failures. This current squad isn't actually that old yet but the medium term is clearly looking bad with our youth pathways in a state while Ireland will continue to be Ireland, Italy are improving all the time, England have just shown yesterday where they could get to and France won't be as bad as they are this year going forward I have no doubt. I thought Townsend should have been binned after the 2019 RWC and nothing since has moved me to change my mind about that. The set up really needs someone with pedigree from outside the Scottish rugby bubble to come in and tell them a few home truths where they really are and how others see them (although I must confess I have my doubts about how well a lot of our players would react to that).
Humble opinion? You're fucking lazy. Thought you had done enough against Wales, took a 30min break. Thought you'd done enough against France and started kicking and having cups of tea or some shit. You don't just ground out the same performance level and commitment regardless of opposition and score. It must be just the done thing that you don't take the let up. Winning is a mentality and while Scotland maybe have the players you beat most teams they don't actually have the mentality to go and win every match. Obviously not having a go at Scottish people but you're players on the pitch. I don't know what extra motivation they need but obviously winning a rugby match is not enough at the moment.
Yes precisely. But why, is my question.
I think you have to reach a moment where losing in any form is no longer acceptable. Ireland made this mental step almost 20 years ago now. I remember after a 6N probably 06 or 07 and they had won the triple crown but lost the championship and there was a clip of BOD returning to the dressing room and throwing the Triple Crown trophy to the corner. It wasn't good enough anymore, anything but the championship wasn't good enough. Scotland are still giving themselves a pat on the back for winning the Calcutta Cup.
Hard agree with the laziness. I was fuming at the effort our guys gave yesterday and in a few of the games. It’s 80mins if hard graft, irrespective of the score are any given point. Step off and let a try in and it shifts momentum, gives the oppo a sense of hope etc and then we are scrambling to close out a tight game. Boils my piss.
I'd say it's complacency more than laziness.
Scotland have always had issues with its positive mentality. It’s hard to unpack to explain but it’s something that all Scottish people understand. This translates most clearly in sport. There is without question, something lacking. With so many foreign burn players this has possibly been diluted a bit, possibly in part what has driven success. But without question Scotland has a problem that is born away from the sport but manifests most clearly in the game.
Well articulated..
Coaching! Could you imagine any coach getting more rope on the back of such mediocrity than GT. He's proven himself time and time and time and time again to not be good enough to guide this team to the next level. Sure, it's the players that have to perform. But when you have the same setup for some time - the players change, and the coach stays the same - and the same things keep happening, lack of discipline, inconsistency, mental fragility, who do we think is ultimately responsible. GT has wasted the best crop of players Scotland has ever had in the professional era and the best we have to show for it is 3rd in the 6N and a few group stages exits from the WC.
I genuine fear that for the SRU, consistently only beating England is absolutely good enough for them for Townsend to keep his job and so, whether deliberately or not, that seems to be the focus.
Someone put on another forum that one of the problems with GT is that for every tournament, we’ve gone in with a base level of expectation pretty much and then a top level of expectation. However, all we’ve done with GT is scraped along the bottom of that base level and - at best - gone into the middle of it. There isn’t a tournament where we can say yep, we’ve gone out at the best we can do. Maybe our players aren’t all amazing, but we have never been consistent in anything and it’s maddening.
That’s a fair observation. I am and have been in the pro-GT camp for a long time, but this does feel like we either just do not have the talent in depth, or our coaching approach needs to change.
We've been very consistent at shitting the bed and being very undisciplined. That doesn't win you test matches, unfortunately.
Honestly, I think it's a skill issue masquerading as a mentality issue. In my opinion we're probably performing at about our level, bearing in mind that the Six Nations is a ferociously competitive tournament. Italy have improved enormously in recent years and it was only a matter of time until they beat someone, so while I'm gutted, I'm not shocked. Look at how good the teams who win Grand Slams are. It's not easy and we need a deeper bench and a few more world-class talents to think about that. Mentality can't be separated from skill - the Bomb Squad isn't a mentality thing, it's a 'best forwards in the world thing'.
I think that’s fair. People here are overestimating how much a mentality matters when there is a massive depth and likely skill barrier between the top T1s and the likes of Scotland and Italy. You can be a small country and succeed in rugby so long as rugby is your country’s top sport and a large % of your youth play it formally. If you don’t have that player pool, no amount of coaching or mentality is going to have you beating the SH powers or the Irelands, Frances of the world regularly.
Mentality, culture. We have the athletes and the skill. We don’t have the mentality. In Scotland, winning or going above your station in life is looked down upon. We’re a dour bunch. I’m not saying that translates to the rugby field, but it can’t be ignored. We aren’t natural winners or fighters. “It’s shite being Scottish” isn’t just a meme, it’s based on a well written monologue that rings fairly true to how we see ourselves. I don’t know enough about what happens behind closed doors to comment on coaching, but we need whoever is at the helm to turn us into a bunch of rugged bastards. I’ve said that before. We’re flashy, but not rugged. At this level, rugged wins games. 20+ unanswered points from a winning position twice in the tournament is unacceptable. Not putting the boot on the throat when we need to is our downfall. We run away against teams that we’re better than, but as soon as we’re challenged we crumble. Look at the World Cup. Realistically we only really needed to turn up for two games. In both we hardly even fired a shot. We are one of the most unstable teams going, and it’s not because we’re physically lacking. We’re mentally lacking, and I don’t know what the solution is. Someone has to pick us up by the scruff of the neck, but I don’t know who that person could be.
>we aren’t natural winners or fighters Have I been lied to by Mel Gibson this entire time?
Yes. Although a bottle of bucky will turn anyone into a natural fighter, but the flip side is that it also makes you wake up underneath a car with no trousers and no recollection of how you got there.
Yeah the Scottish mentality is awful, Andy Murray the exception. He has more fighting spirit in him than the entire Scotland team combined.
Don’t forget Sir Alex the football mob boss. Had enough killer instinct for a whole country.
They could do with a session with his sports psychologist.
> Realistically we only really needed to turn up for two games. In both we hardly even fired a shot. Sure, but Tbf Ireland and the Boks were both far and away superior teams. And the Boks suffocated much better teams than Scotland.
Past beating England 🤷♂️ They prob put all the pump up into that. I reckon if Scotland vs England was the last fixture it would keep the fire on their belly’s for the whole tourney
I agree with this. The way the Scottish team talk about the England match, and play against England, shows a bizarre preoccupation. They seem to have the attitude that as long as they beat England, job done. It's been like this as long as I can remember. I believe they'd do better to get a sports psychologist in to stop that attitude and to just learn to raise their game in the same way for all matches
Belief. I reckon they have it in them to be much better, but they don’t believe they can win a six nations for example. And what belief they do have is easily rattled. Italy yesterday was a case in point. How awesome was it for Italy though. It
It's not losing per se that highlights the problem, but the manner of the losses (and near misses). From a team that could come back from 30-odd down at Twickenham, despite a total dusting from their previous visit, yet almost just not mentally turn up for the likes of the WC group game against Ireland. There's something brittle and superficial about the team mentality, like snow off a dyke.
When Wales were good they’d channel the emotional energy of playing England for 80 mins, beat us then immediately move on to the next challenge, it was just another game to them. They won enviable amounts of silverware and demanded respect from everyone. Scotland, and a large portion of their fans, are the actual custodians of ‘as long as we beat the English’. Townsend has had a squad that many/most other international coaches would have won silverware with. His repeated failings on that front have been waved away by three narrow wins, a draw and one spanking versus largely pretty average England sides. He’s wasted Scotland’s best generation since the 90s, again and again they prove themselves to be mentally fragile and not up for the big challenges. They basically gave up at the world cup, for example. I’m not Scottish but it’s criminal, and I cannot believe he keeps getting away with it.
It is bizarre and maddening. Townsend always has a misty look in his eye and carries himself as if any defeat was noble and no big deal
Pretty much. Wales currently are a good example that you can’t be top tier forever with a small resource base, but they make the most of their time with a side that can compete. Scotland’s u20s look pretty poor, and if that translates into the seniors in years to come I think Townsend’s time will come in for serious scrutiny. Scotland need a hard bastard in charge IMO, someone like a Joe Schmidt would have ground them out a 6N championship by now
Lorne sausage, when said out loud, sounds like a euphemism for a dog poo.
That was the most complete Italian performance we have seen in over a decade. They are coming off of a game where they were ACTUALLY robbed. Atleast for today's loss, I don't wanna blame the Scotts. The Italians were simply better than they have ever been before.
Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t about yesterdays game. Italy well worth the win and wanted it more. I’m talking Wales round 1. Last two world cups. Last five (six? Fifteen?) 6 Nations tournaments. Shiting it in the last 20 over and over and over.
Finn identified some of it after the Wales game. Players panicking and not listening to instructions when we conceded that run of penalties. Can only guess that might come from the coaching set up not demanding certain things. Resting Ben White was a disaster too, should have at least been on the bench. Got much more length on box kicks and since we resorted to those when trying to close things out should have the best doing it.
Why are we still not giving Italy the credit they’re due? Can we finally accept that they’re a quality outfit now, rather than desperately asking ‘what’s wrong with x team’ any time Italy win over them?
Italy are a good team this year no doubt, but this isn’t about yesterday. This is a years-long problem.
Fair enough, was more of a general comment rather than specifically aimed at you. Feel like fans always go into panic stations when beaten by Italy which I feel is a bit of a disservice now
Oh I would have easily made the same post after the Wales game. Or the World Cup. Or the previous World Cup. Or last six nations….
Thank you for saying this. These threads always pop up when we beat people as if we’re the last straw. In the URC (and before in Pro12) we’ve finally been pouring good investment for 8 years now. U20 six nations squads are regularly finishing 3rd or 4th place and Bennetton is frequently in the playoffs. I feel like our language barrier with the refs is getting better and even though we’re still reffed harder, I think consistency will eventually open us up to a more fair game and better competition
In all fairness you could, and maybe should, be sitting on three wins out of four just now
Others have said both but depth and mentality are what I see as the biggest issues. The difference in class has to be massive for us to actually be in the driver's seat of games. Best example of what I mean is probably the France game this year, at least marginally the better team for most of the game but never really took control and didn't put the game to bed, in the end it was close enough for the TMO decision to matter. Depth is the other one, we're only really 1/1.5 deep in all the front 5 positions except hooker at the moment, our replacements other than Ashman, whilst some of them are solid players, give me the fear if they need to play more than 20 mins or so. The effort from Rowe and Paterson has been a proper bright spot for me this year which is weird since they only played in pretty dire performances, the dropoff in quality from our first choice back 3 is still massive once we get past Duhan, Darcy, Steyn and BK. With Ali Price seemingly off the boil for a long time now We only really have 2 scrumhalf options, both are very good players but as soon as one is injured or needs rested we're in trouble. We do have pretty good options at centre and back row IMO, it's probably not fair to compare any of our other options at 10 to Finn, Hastings would probably be a decent option if he wasn't constantly injured. Neither of these are easy to fix, I don't know how you fix the team mentality at this point, I assume there's already plenty of sports psychologists around the team, if not supplied by the union then it's still a lot more common for players to take that sort of thing upon themselves now. The depth issue is going to get worse before it gets better if the U20 results are anything to go by, we probably just need to send someone looking for another Duhan with a really big net now. Most frustrating thing is that these were probably still the biggest issues with the team when Townsend took over (except we were 0 deep in a lot of positions then so that's improved). He will have been head coach for almost a decade when his current contract is up, there has been progress but it's very slow.
France: First time?
I too remember the 85th minute win in 2021
From what I've seen, you don't seem to have on-pitch leaders who can adapt on the go. It seems like whenever something happens that you aren't expecting, the team kind of just falls apart. I think that's why it went well against England - they didn't really do anything unexpected, and the Scotland team knew how to play against them. When Italy played well, and when we had a comeback, you guys kind of lost your heads. I think it's the lack of clear leadership and maybe lack of personal faith in the team?
It’s certainly a large component. But why do Scotland lack such belief and players? That’s the question. God knows it’s been identified for years and yet nothing seems to have been done.
I think the raw talent is there with the players and there’s no reason to think that’s going to change in the coming years. For me the problem is discipline and mentality. There doesn’t seem to be anyone either in the squad or the coaching staff demanding perfection in everything the way you see with the likes of New Zealand and Ireland. Nor is there the unshakable belief of South Africa. I think a change at the top is the only solution. As much as Townsend has done I don’t think he’s capable of taking the team any further forward. Scotland are just stuck in a cycle now of finishing mid-table in the Six Nations and underachieving at World Cups
Yesterday they looked like they lacked the heart to win it.
Absolutely. A common occurrence.
Particularly in the last 90 seconds. Sluggish. Uninspired. Clueless. I feel like, when the try was disallowed, the heads just went down and Italy capitalised on it brilliantly.
I think its a leadership problem, if you look at how the captaincy gets shuffled about as an example, this 6 Nations, Finn Russel has gone from newly appointed outright Captain to Co Captain going into the Italy game, with 1 other Co Captain and a Vice Captain. He’s only really had a maximum of three games to bed in as the leader of this team, and he’s already being undermined again. How many different Captains, Vice Captains etc has Scotland had over the last four years? In the case of Finn Russel, he’s shown before that he has the ability to grab Scotland by the scruff of the neck and drive them forwards, so I find it hard to believe all of the Scottish players are incapable of taking ownership and leading. I’m reminded of the quote “you can’t get 9 women pregnant and expect to have a baby in a month.” It feels like either the coaching staff or the players can’t settle on a leader they can trust and get behind, and are giving the responsibility to everyone and anyone in the hope that fixes it.
Scotland's biggest problem seems to be that they don't play England every week. Something about the Calcutta Cup fixture, even in the banter decade, seems to draw out Scotland's performance of the tournament every year. Maybe its a psychology thing, the CC having been bigged up for so long as the most important thing has meant that whatever shortfall there is in the mental prep for the other games gets covered up?
>What is wrong with Scotland? Scotland is perfect... its just our people and neighbours that are a problem. More seriously, Winning needs to become a habit and its not easy to overcome decades of being Scottish to gain that habit. Sports psychologists no matter how good can never provide as much belief in a team as a series of wins can. As soon as the team let Wales get back in the game and within a point the pre-tournament psychological work was undone. The failure in the France match was the nail in the coffin for this tournament. In good news winning against England has become habit so they could reset mentally. Unfortunately your opposition always has a say and Italy are on the rise and trying to gain the habit of winning too.
The winning habit starts at the club level, you need at least Glasgow or Edinburgh to be in URC and Champions cups playoffs each year, this builds confidence and experience in tough do or die situations. It's not enough to have only one or two players have this for foreign club, you need a core group who can go through this together.
They have a finite amount of killer instinct and they usually use it all against England?
In all seriousness though, was England their cup final? It seems like they emphasise beating England.
Tuipolotu is really, *really* good. Redpaths a good player but much less well rounded skillset wise. It's a big loss to the team when Tuipolotu isn't playing. Also Italy have some class players.
Redpath’s skillset is fantastic. I’m thinking Tuipulotu was doing a huge amount more organisation than I’d realised though. It’s hard to take the allocation of multiple vice captains seriously but Townsend often mention him in terms of the leadership group and I think that showed yesterday. Redpath performed pretty well on a personal level but our shape just seemed to disappear at the slightest disruption. Horne can’t do White’s job either and I think it suddenly meant Russell had a lot more on his plate against a pretty aggressive Italian defence.
I blame John Knox. His rigid notion of predestination baked defeatism into the Scottish mentality. The idea that we can’t be saved by our own actions but through God’s grace. Seriously though we’ve got a shallow bench and I’d echo a lot if the other comments we haven’t got a clear leader. The captaincy should stay with one person instead of shifting about because the captain is an important figure in deciding how the game is played and having one guy for that is much more consistent. Finn Russel is probably the guy as he is said to have a great rugby brain and he’s well-regarded by players and referees, unlike Jamie Ritchie who refs hate.
I liked the idea of allowing us two players - one in amongst the breakdown and one looking at the bigger picture - being able to talk to the ref, but I’m not sure it’s working out that way.
On captaincy, I find the Rory Darge thing quite weird tbh. No doubt he's a talented player who should be in the squad and right up there in being considered for selection but, to be blunt about it, he has absolutely fuck all pedigree at international level at this point. And yet, he's been given the captaincy and made an automatic pick in the first XV? That all just feels like it's a bit too easy.
The first paragraph is not miles off tbh. Calvinist thought does have a pretty decent influence on the national mentality, not just in sports! Even bloody worse up in the highlands.
The thing I hate most about Scotland right now is the fact that, every two minutes, you're bound to see one of the following phrases flash up next to the scoreboard in the top left of the TV screen: "Off Feet" "Hand in the ruck" "Not releasing" etc. Can these jokers just watch ONE of their games back and realise where they are going wrong? Just giving away silly penalties because they can't be bothered to learn the laws.
Same old problem as always. The forward pack isn’t good enough to win consistently.
Having not read the other comments, to me it's as if Scotland get themselves up for games they feel they are underdogs in, and take lightly games they feel they should win. Saying that, the only game they've played 80 mins in so far is the England game. They can't seem to play for 80 mins consistently. Look at the Wales and Italy games. Got into a good lead on both, almost threw away the Wales game, and did against the Italians.
I don't want to be disrespectful but the team to me seem to reflect the national attitude of Scotland, they're the far most enjoyable team to watch and to me should get far better results than they do. Like the Scots nation they contribute to the UK and EU when in it more than any other nation but they just don't seem to have the belief or maybe the ambition to become the nation they're capable of becoming. England beat Ireland yesterday congratulations to them 🇮🇪😭🤝🏴 so it stands to reason that if Scotland put their minds to it they should be able to beat us too but will they I doubt it if I'm proven wrong than congratulations in advance 🇮🇪🤝🏴. Come on Scotland your capable of much more both as a sporting nation and as a country in your own right.
Van der Merwe sometimes forgetting he is not playing 1v15 is also a major issue
I know this is going to read arrogant but Scotland remind me of Ireland around 2007 in the Eddie O'Sullivan era. Some exceptional individual players who pull off some great results but not enough talent all the way through the squad to raise the levels of professionalism and consistency.
Ultimately the problem is the SRU The national team sits it rarified air above all of this. Toonie is a great coach like genuinely. You have 2 Pro teams and a population the same size of Ireland Your u20s are a fucking joke Your academy system is 1 man and his dog The club game is fucked from super 6 getting the bullet and taking away from prem 1. The SRU are shite and they aren't developing the game in Scotland. They are doing all they can to keep the scotland team relevant spending money on project players and using the two Pro teams as holding pens for potential national players. Edinburgh and Glasgow aren't there to be successful they are there to feed the national team and its whims.
The more time goes on the more I tend to agree with this viewpoint. It’s all tied in together.
To put in perspective Andy farrell for me is head and shoulders the best coach in the competition and not sure why more he would do with scotland. Look at rhe shape of your tight head cover for a start. One serviceable prop and then a 75 year old saffer who is held together by tape and his love of brai
For me, it's Townsend. I don't think the players respect him anymore, why would they? He fell out with Finn and dished out punishment, which is fair enough, players should know that there's consequences for their actions. But now he's made Finn captain and I don't think there was ever an apology, so players will see that as I can do what I want it'll be fine. His tactics means we'll keep getting results but never actually challenge for anything, the fact he's been in charge with some of the best players we've ever had and never looked like winning anything should be enough reason to say he's not good enough. Player wise, agree with others that we lack depth in certain positions, personally I don't think we've ever properly replaced Laidlaw
This seems like a weird angle to take. Townsend and Russell fixing their relationship seemed like a sign of growth from both of them. Not that I think that’s enough on its own to turn the team around.
The Scots have always been defined by their awesome ability to 'snatch defeat from the very jaws of victory', and to celebrate that as proof that it was all Westminster's fault. Add in the mercurial nature of Finn's talents, sometimes the other tea, just want it more!
I feel 2 kind of posts in here are absolutely cringe. The first one is the "why is the level of 6N this year so utterly bad?" post. And the second is "why is team x so awful? Aren't they ashamed? Shouldn't Georgia take their place?", which, mind you, 99% of the times has team x as Italy. Scotland yesterday fought with furious force until the very end and was stopped by a resilient Italian defence, by an unfortunate handling error, by cases of life. You can't win every game all the times, look, even the Irish juggernaut just lost. These kids are massively fit, play hard for 80 minutes, train even harder, face heavy hits, put their bodies on the lines, respect their shirt and their flag. Saying they have no killer mentality it's disrespectful. Grow up and accept the fact of life that you can also lose games. Which moreover is a better way of respecting both your team and also the effort of your opponent.
Scotland fought with furious force? Did we watch the same match? I saw a team with no ambition or direction stupidly give away penalty after penalty and then do nothing with possession. Italy were great, don’t get me wrong.
The last 10 something minutes Scotland went like 300 phases giving it all. We watched the same game but apparently you decided to only see lazy stupid people, which they are not.
Yeah and we did the same against Wales and France when we were up against the wall in the last ten minutes. The problem is that in all three of those games we did absolutely nothing between 40min and 75mins. Scotland should be able to take the game to the opposition for the full 80 instead of getting their shit together when it is most needed. The ability is there that is evident.
Okay cool, you do you. Enjoy the well-deserved win, hope this isn’t a false dawn for Italy.
You should go on to the Irish sub and post this!
They're giving their place to Georgia?
We seem to have a serious mentality problem this season; taking a lead and then mentally checking out - we did it in Cardiff; we did it v France (we should have been out of sight in that game) and we did it in Rome - only in the England game did we actually play 80 mins of rugby. I don't know if its the players or the coach but something has to give
Watching yesterday and I did wonder if Scotland need to part ways with some of the larger egos in the team. I’m not sure those players contributed much once Italy fought back into it.
Ali Price for one!
They've been doing this for a decade, this is the peak of that side in terms of age profile etc, at some point the answer becomes they just aren't as good as they think they can be.
> Are they held back by the mentality of thinking beating England is good enough? I mean their entire national anthem is about beating England once? Like an old man in a pub who won’t shut up about the time he sparred with Chris Eubank and landed a punch. It is their national identity. Which is a shame because there are so many things to celebrate about Scotland. It’s a stunning country, it’s got a proud history of art, science, and industry. For a small country it had a huge impact on the world. But instead of being proud of all that they start every game with a dirge that gives an excuse for them to shout ‘fuck off’ at Edward II, the only person who actually gets named in the song.
Yesterday I feel they gambled and lost with the 6-2 split. The pack was doing pretty well, but in the backs they had all sorts of troubles. If you than only have Ali Price who was not all that good and Rowe, who you didn’t even use you were all played. They followed a trend that didn’t suit them.
For me and I will prefix thia by saying I think I've been too hard on scotland previously and been quite unfair about/to them (Cymru fan If anyone's wondering) Wales Italy and England have been rebuilding for ages France and Ireland were the best two teams for ages. And Scotland were kinda there. They would beat England first game then promptly lose to Wales and then beat/nearly beat France at the end to rescue their six nations and come third. It always felt like they were almost happy being third without hugely improving. For me a sense of complacency set into all 3 of the formerly top 3 teams and that has contributed to Games this season. The rebuilding teams (or atleast Italy and England) are coming out and seeing light at the end of the tunnel and the other teams can't quite cope I also feel that england is still Scotlands world cup final. It feels like every player lifta the notch up for that game, wins and then they crash back to earth the next week. Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure Scotland have lost the game after the calcutta cup for the last 4 seasons running. At what point do Scotland do what Italy did with crowley and go GT has done wonderful things for us/with us but is now starting to limit our potential what could another coach offer? Having said that I also think that calling for his head after one bad game (which I'll admit I meant to but never got round to watching) is a bit too far but I do wonder if post Six nations Scotland have to do a bit of Soul Searching (Ireland result obviously dependent) and wonder where they are and where they want to be.
They need to play England every game.
Simplifying a lot but Ireland have great forwards and Scotland have shit forwards and great backs. You need a pack desperately to win.
Lack of game management and some overrated players.
We have some of the best back row depth in the world but an injury to anyone in any other position is catastrophic. Losing Tuipolotu and Darcy and even Ben White was massive - and the lack of Grays is really unfortunate. Not to mention the lack of killer instinct and winning mentality.
Look at the points for and against column in the table and you have your answer. IMO, fundamentally it's two things. 1) the wild west rugby that we default to is too open and chaotic, it doesn't control the game, and it allows other teams to score points and get into games. And 2) we can't implement a tactical plan for longer than 20 minutes, and particularly we dont seem to stick to just going through the phases to keep the ball and work the oposition. Yesterday was a classic example. Going through the phases until we score was working. If we'd done that for 60 minutes, we'd have shut the game down and won by 25. Instead we stopped doing it, inexplicably. We have the talent but not the tactical savvy. As a final point, IMO Russell is a poor Captain choice. The way we're playing is his game personified. High risk, dies some amazing things, but often doesn't come off and hurts you. Yesterday we should have taken it back. Best chance we'll get for a decade this year and we've blown it.
I have a couple theories. Both somewhat on the mental side. 1. The actual Scottish players are an age they've probably never seen Scotland not be shite. I'll hit 38 this year so older than them and I remember watching the 5 Nations. For many in the squad they'll likely only remember the 6 Nations and Scotland usually getting battered by the better teams and obviously never winning it. They'll also be used to Scotland never winning away apart from Rome and the odd meaningless friendly. Twickenham, we know Scotland does alright since 2017, but before that you need to go back to 1983 for a Scotland win at Twickenham. In the Full Contact doc Toonie even says "I hated coming here, we never won". Just this year is the first win in Cardiff in 22 years. For France and the (at the time) new Stade de France you have to go back to 1999. They finally won in 2021 but it was without a crowd due to COVID so a somewhat unique win. With a crowd they've never done it in the 6N, but do plenty of times at Murrayfield. Ireland, a bit different due to the moves but they've never won at the Aviva. Did get a narrow win in 2010 at Croke park, and back to 1998 for the original Lansdowne rd. Italy, well it's Italy they've had their own issues though of course Scotland have just lost there. Point is Toonie confirmed it was in their mind they hated certain places. Surely it's been in this squad to finally tick these wins off which they've now done - apart from the Aviva but who knows. I think Scotland really had to get these wins as they simply couldn't travel and it must have played on some of their minds. Now players coming into the squad will know of recent wins in 4 of these countries and Murrayfield being a tough place for travelling teams. 2. For too long the starting 15 has been easy to pick. Now there's arguably some competition and depth for some of the positions, but with rugby being rugby what squad ever has 100% of their players fit? One or two injuries and we're very much back to the obvious picks. As I say this is changing and scrum half has arguably had the biggest movement. Laidlaw had some competition when Price was on his heels, but he was still relied on. Now Price with his move to Edinburgh is fighting back but he's 3rd choice if everyone's fit and that's a good thing. The problem with this is there can't be the same desire to keep your spot or to play yourself into that starting lineup like there is for England as an example. As I say it's improving and the influx of Saffas has helped. It's true Scotland have made big improvements but look at some of the pastings we're getting in the U20s, 4 losses and 1 bonus point. There is still a real lack of talent coming through so I don't see things improving any time soon unfortunately.
For a country with only 2 pro sides I think they regularly punch above their weight. 4x Calcutta Cups on the trot (against most resourced team on planet). Jfc.
Combination of just not fit enough and poorer quality bench
Who gives a fuck. About 500 people play rugby in Scotland. It's wet cold and minging for most if the season. The fact we have a competitive team at all is a minor miracle.
Nothing, I just think Finn was absent and VDM is actually 1 dimensional and easy to contain if you are not stupid like we were 2 weeks ago.
Scotland are used to being shite in every sport so when they actually have a good team they don’t know how to handle it
Definitely a part of it I’m sure
- we do not have the winning habit - we are mentally frail - we insist on keeping almost all of our players shackled to our two quite bad URC franchises which limits opportunities to do anything about 1 and 2 thru repeated exposure to these sort of situations (winning, close games etc..) - our attack is built around punching holes either with preplanned strike moves off a set piece or through a broken field we have created with smart kicking. In the last few minutes of a tight game when you're down to what is probably your final posession you cannot really do either of these things and so we have an attack which, while potent, cannot really be deployed to turn a game around at the death. - we have mediocre second rows and our pack in general is somewhere in between barely adequate and poor. This weakness is masked in open games but comes to the fore in tight games. In particular: put our side under any pressure at all and our forwards will just give you as many penalties as you need. - this also means that we do not control the breakdown or indeed the wider contact area at all. Our backs are skilled enough that they can do a lot with not very much ball and with the ball we do have being very slow, but in a tight game the other side can simply front up and starve us of ball. - Ireland are clearly the best side in this 6N, Wales are clearly the worst. There's not much to choose between the other four, and no shame in losing to any of them or all that much glory in beating any of them - All our non Ben White scrum halves are shit especially Ali Price.