Why Scotland newbie Matthews merits his call-up - Steve Tandy

I see a few key Frenchies are out so i would expect this team to do a pretty good job.

The potential to blast FRA into outer space is real. That said, if Samupeni (injury prone) &/or Paddy (niggle) get injured, or both, we’re in the sh*t. Also, Holland is moving into an untested physical stress situation so there’s uncertainty there. Fingers (& everything else) crossed.

Go the Mighty All Blacks go!!!!

Scrums went as follows in the first game (I’m going from a handy dandy compilation video I made from screen recordings so I don’t have exact ref calls)

1. Canadian feed - Reset. On second feed, Canada gets the ball away, but South African scrum pushes into them

2. South African feed - South Africa gets the ball away clean

3. Canadian feed - Free kick to South Africa

4. South African feed - South Africa pulls the ball forward in the scrum a few meters, gets advantage, and gets the ball away clean

5. Canadian feed - Canada gets the ball away clean.

6. South African feed - South Africa push Canada backwards, but give away a penalty

7. South African feed - South Africa pulls the ball forward in the scrum maybe 10ish meters, gets advantage, and gets the ball away clean

8. South African feed - Free kick to Canada

9. South African feed - South Africa gets the ball away clean

10. South African feed - South Africa makes meters in the scrum and gets the ball away clean

11. South African feed - Reset. On second feed, South Africa makes meters in the scrum, gets advantage, and gets the ball away clean

12. Canadian feed - South Africa push them backwards, but give away a penalty

13. Canadian feed - 75 minutes into the game, Canada pulls the ball forward at the scrum and get advantage

I haven’t done such thorough analysis for the second test, but if you enjoy scrumming at all, you should really watch these games. They’re the sort of games where you look forwards to knock ons because the scrums are so good.

I am genuinely interested in seeing how Dalton Papalii performs at blindside flanker in the second half when he comes on for the always underachieving Samipeni Finau.

Papalii has very few, if any, opportunities to carry the ball in wider channels playing openside for the Blues. Interested to see if he is capable of being a ball carrier and lineout ball winner. I know he hits hard and frequently on D.

However having nailed my colours to the mast, the rest of the 7”s are very good. Jac Morgan would be my backup. Pollock I don’t think will be in the picture till the Lions see how the first test pans out.