Gregor Townsend: Scotland players bonding across the Atlantic
Gregor Townsend believes the intensity of Scotland’s month-long summer tour of the Americas is proving to be a hugely beneficial learning experience.
The Scots will be aiming to make it three wins in succession against Chile in Santiago in Saturday night after high-margin victories over Canada in Ottawa and the United States in Washington already this month.
But in addition to playing matches, Townsend has been enjoying the rare chance to get so much time – on and off the training pitch – in the company of his players, particularly those who are in the squad for the first time.
“We learn so much, we learn about people as individuals,” said the head coach. “It’s the first time we have worked with a number of players and got to know them.
“They get to know what a Test environment looks like and obviously learn from players that have been here before, players that are leading for us.
“To have four weeks, more than four weeks because we had time at home as well with the group, is great. You get to spend time coaching, they get the experience of playing Test rugby, and enjoying being in their team-mates’ company in the four great countries we are visiting.”
Forwards Ewan Johnson, Nathan McBeth and Will Hurd will all make their first starts against Chile after winning their first caps as subs against Canada, while Paddy Harrison could make his debut off the bench.
Townsend is looking forward to an “open” game in Santiago in his team’s penultimate outing of their tour before they face Uruguay in Montevideo next weekend.
“Chile are a different team (to the United States and Canada),” he said. “They definitely play a style of rugby that will challenge our defence, they move the ball a lot.
“They’ve got a lot of individual players that can break tackles. Throughout the World Cup, they had some of the best stats in beating defenders.
“Conditions are supposed to be dry, so I would expect it to be a much more open game, both from what we’re able to do with the ball, but also the way Chile play.
“And the fact is that they’re playing a Six Nations team at home at the national stadium, it’s going to be massive for them, so you can imagine that they’ll bring a lot of physicality.”
Scotland team to face Chile: Rowe, Dobie, Steyn, Tuipulotu (all Glasgow), Reed (Sale), Healy (Edinburgh), Warr (Sale); McBeth (Glasgow), Richardson (Sharks), Hurd (Leicester), Craig (Scarlets), Johnson (Oyonnax), Brown (Glasgow), Ritchie (Edinburgh), Bayliss (Bath).
Replacements: Harrison, Schoeman, Sebastian, Currie (all Edinburgh), Williamson, Darge, Hastings, McDowall (all Glasgow)
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Spectacular fail at whatever point you were trying to make. The Boks currently is unbeatable, using 2 different teams, 3 different times during this RC. How many teams can claim that? Now because nothing the haters say matters as everyone sees their willful hate speech for what it is, you try to pop in the political scene of SA as some reason that makes no sense at all. The political situation in SA is highly volatile, the country's crime rate is through the roof and it's not a safe country, no matter how beautiful it is. Which just makes what the SPRINGBOKS did, and is still doing that much more AMAZING. For such a broken country to bring forth such talent and for such racist people (just not true) to work together to go back to back WC champs, nevermind all the other current achievements, they seem to be united in passion and love for the sport that no other country possess. Who are you to try and minimise what other people go through? To make lite of our hardships? Our struggles? What a small excuse of a cockroach you are. You should be ashamed
Go to commentsHe’s 106kg
Needs to stack some weight on
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