Scotland's senior players 'have gone to a different level' in quest for top-three finish

Scotland’s men’s team may have flattered to deceive in another Six Nations, but for the nation’s women’s side, the Championship starting this weekend provides an inviting opportunity to hit a notable milestone on the road towards this year’s Rugby World Cup.

The top two in the table has proved a no-go area for Gregor Townsend’s troops, with two third-place finishes in 2018 and 2023 the high points of his eight campaigns in charge. Scotland’s women did finish runners-up behind England way back in 2003, but it is still 20 years since they last ventured into the top half of the table with third place in 2005.

Those two decades include a grim seven-year period, from the second game of the 2010 Six Nations to round three of 2017, where they failed to win a single match in 36 attempts until a 15-14 win over Wales finally put a run of 34 successive defeats to bed.

But a core of players who started their Test careers at the tail-end of that awful losing streak now form the experienced backbone of a side with loftier ambitions under head coach Bryan Easson, who presided over a memorable 13-13 draw with France in his first game in charge in the autumn of 2020.

Bryan Easson, now in his fifth year at the helm, has guided Scotland to 12 wins in their last 16 Tests (Photo Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)

Qualifying for the 2021 Rugby World Cup (held in 2022) for the first time in 12 years was a major fillip, although a testing run of 12 straight defeats - five by a single score - before, during and after the tournament threatened to undermine progress.

But as the benefits of the first tranche of professional contracts – first awarded by Scottish Rugby in late 2022 - started to kick in and more of Scotland’s leading players gravitated south towards the increasingly cosmopolitan Premiership Women’s Rugby in England, a steady upturn has been borne out by results.

Beating Italy and Ireland in Edinburgh in the final two rounds of the 2023 Six Nations kick-started a period of success which has now yielded 12 victories in their last 16 Tests, a remarkable turnaround in fortunes.

Fraser is really detail-orientated and drove very high standards as a player. As a coach he is very similar.

That run included winning the inaugural WXV2 tournament in 2023 and another two-win Six Nations campaign last year for a second straight fourth-place finish.

Scotland were briefly ranked five in the world – their highest ever ranking - last September after handsome victories over Wales and Fiji, and although they fell short of winning WXV2 for a second year, going down 31-22 to Australia, qualification for RWC2025 in England was duly secured.

That WXV2 tournament in October, for teams below the elite top six nations, saw former Scotland men’s hooker Fraser Brown join Easson’s staff as forwards coach.

Brown played in the 2015 and 2019 World Cups and won the last of his 61 Scotland caps in March 2023 (Photo Harry How - World Rugby via Getty Images)

The 35-year-old dipped his toe into coaching with Watsonians’ men’s team in the semi-pro Super Series and then the Warriors’ women’s side in the Celtic Challenge during an injury-ravaged final year of his own playing career at Glasgow.

His impact has been swiftly felt, according to captain Rachel Malcolm, one of 10 players in the squad with between 40 and 70 caps.

“Fraser is really detail-orientated and I love the detail he brings to our set-piece,” she said. “He drove very high standards as a player and as a coach he is very similar, but he has been very good with some of our younger, inexperienced players and helped them develop really quickly.”

Two of those new faces will make their debuts in Saturday’s opening Six Nations fixture against Wales, the first of three at Edinburgh’s Hive Stadium, which has become the women’s home over the past three years.

Bristol Bears lock Hollie Cunningham, who previously played for England Under-20s but qualifies for Scotland through an Aberdonian grandmother, will start the game, while fellow second-row Adelle Ferrie, who has emerged from Corstorphine Cougars in the Scottish Premiership via a stint with Edinburgh in the Celtic Challenge into the national squad aged 27, is set for her debut from the bench.

Hollie Cunningham has helped Bristol Bears reach a PWR final and semi-final in the past two seasons (Photo Ryan Hiscott/Getty Images)

“Hollie played every game for Bristol this year and 80 minutes for the majority of them,” Brown noted. “She is a big and powerful but a really clever rugby player. She does her work off the pitch, her detail and knowledge is very good, and she’s been really impressive since she came in.

“Adelle is a good story for us and for her. It doesn’t matter what your age is or where you’re playing. If you perform, you can get rewarded at the next level and if you perform there, you are rewarded again. There is a genuine route into the Scotland team.”

While Brown has relished working with some of the nine uncapped players in the Six Nations squad these past few weeks, he believes the desire of the older players to evolve their own games has been key to the side’s progression in recent times.

Sometimes the worry with an older group is that they can be a little bit set in their ways. What really surprised me is that here it is the opposite.

"When you have new and young players in a group, it’s always brilliant because they naturally bring a lot of energy and lots of questions – they are very inquisitive,” he said.

“Sometimes the worry with an older group is that they can be a little bit set in their ways. What really surprised me coming in during the summer is that here it is the opposite. Some who have impressed me most are the most experienced players.

“Our young players will naturally progress as they are more and more exposed to this level, but it is our older, more experienced players whose games have gone to a different level. This group has got a lot of growth still in front of it, but what they have done in the last few months, and the last 12 to 18 months, has been excellent.”

Rachel Malcolm has led Scotland since the 2020 Six Nations and won her 50th cap in the recent WXV2 tournament (Photo Johan Rynners - World Rugby via Getty Images)

Brown believes “captain fantastic” Malcolm, 33, played “some of her best rugby I have seen, both sides of the ball,” in WXV2, and reckons fellow back-rower Jade Konkel, in her 13^th year of Test rugby at the age of 31, is “back to her best” as a powerful, abrasive ball-carrier.

The form of Bristol No.8 Evie Gallagher, another dynamic carrier, means Konkel starts on the bench. But in a ferociously competitive back row, openside Rachel McLachlan, who played second fiddle last year to Alex Stewart - the find of the season in the Scottish women’s game – has regained her place after a productive move to French side Montpellier.

“Rach has come back with the bit between her teeth,” Brown said. “She’s always had that bit of dog as a seven, who will go round and hit things all day, but she's brought some real power back into her game. In France she’s been able to get her hands on the ball more and I’ve definitely seen a big shift in that attacking side of her game.”

Rhona has come back with a whole new energy and confidence. I think we're going to see her explode back onto the international scene in this Six Nations.

In the backline, Scotland will again be guided by fly-half Helen Nelson and the equally experienced Lisa Thomson, who resumes her centre partnership with the dangerous Emma Orr.

While Saracens wing Coreen Grant and Bristol utility back Meryl Smith will both miss the Six Nations as they recover from serious knee injuries, in wings Rhona Lloyd – joint-third on Scotland’s all-time try-scoring list with 25, the same tally as full-back Chloe Rollie - and Fran McGhie (eight tries in 17 Tests), Malcolm believes Scotland have the firepower to thrive.

“Rhona had some upsets selection-wise last year and has not shied away from the fact she struggled off the back of that,” said the skipper. “But she has come back with a whole new energy and confidence around her and I think we are going to see her explode back onto the international scene in this Six Nations.

“If you look at how Fran still managed to shine for Leicester Tigers, a struggling team, in the PWR this season, she has been absolutely phenomenal. She has learned a lot since the last Six Nations and physically she has gone from strength to strength. Those two are going to be very exciting and hopefully finishing off some lovely tries for us.”

Rhona Lloyd has scored 25 tries in 52 Tests for Scotland and also played for GB Sevens (Photo Peter Summers/Getty Images)

Many of the issues faced by Scotland’s men’s side, particularly their struggle to match the greater power, depth and physicality of the world’s leading nations, also ring true for the women.

But like their male counterparts, Malcolm’s team have worked on building a dynamic game-plan using improved fitness, skill and athleticism to challenge opponents.

“We are never going to be the biggest team - we just aren't,” she said. “We just don't build players in this nation the size of other teams. We are not going to try to be like England. We’re going to be true to what we’re about and play the game how we want to play it - that is fast and fit.”

Whether that is sufficient to compete with perennial heavyweights England - chasing a seventh straight title - and France, runners-up for the past five years, is debatable.  As Malcolm acknowledges, “It is not just a case of us improving – they are also pushing to keep that gap as big as they possibly can.”

We showed last year especially how competitive we are against France – we probably should have beaten them here.

A narrow 15-5 loss to France at home last season – it was 5-8 until the final minute – provided some evidence of a partial closing of the gap, but no-one is seriously expecting the Scots to win either at La Rochelle’s Stade Marcel-Deflandre in round two or Leicester’s Welford Road in round four.

But three home games at the Hive against Wales, Italy and Ireland, who deprived them of third place last season with a tense 15-12 win in Belfast on the final day, offer the Scots a decent shot at hitting that landmark top-three finish.

“Obviously France and England away are always going to be tough, but we showed last year especially how competitive we are against France – we probably should have beaten them here,” Brown added.

“La Rochelle is a pretty incredible place to go and play rugby, but those three home games are definitely a big target, and then you never know…that top half of the table has got to be a realistic target for us.”