WE’LL BE RIGHT IN MIX FOR 6
RUGBY AUTUMN INTERNATIONALS SCOTLAND ..... 14 ARGENTINA...9
GRANT GILCHRIST insists the good, bad and the ugly of Scotland’s Autumn Test series can provide a platform for Six Nations glory.
Narrow defeats to Wales and South Africa were the negatives on a report card which also saw a hammering of Fiji and Saturday’s grinding win over Argentina in Edinburgh.
Dark Blues coach Gregor Townsend used the Tests to rotate his squad and experiment in various departments, including Finn Russell being shunted to centre and Adam Hastings calling the shots at fly-half against the Pumas.
But Gilchrist believes home comforts and the Murrayfield factor will be a huge advantage ahead of February’s competition which crucially has the Scots playing three games – against Italy, Ireland and Wales – at home.
“We love playing at Murrayfield,” he said. “We have a good record here so that’s something we can take into the Six Nations. Three home games is an advantage. We play three strong teams at home, so there’s still a lot of hard work that needs to be done.
“But this format does play to our advantage because we’re at home for three of the five games. Like in every Six Nations, it’s about how you start. We’ve got an opportunity to start well and build some momentum.
The 28-year-old Edinburgh lock’s overall assessment of the four recent Tests is positive – although he admits some lessons have been learned.
He said: “We’ve had a good autumn. The Six Nations still seems a long way away but on the whole we’ve done well. Obviously we would have loved to have won those narrow defeats. We feel that we let ourselves down and we could have won those.
“But there is good learning from that and if we do take the good stuff we did and add the learning to make some improvements then we will back ourselves against anybody.
“I’m sure Gregor will have taken a lot on a coaching side. The players have certainly done that from the four-game series and there will be learning across the board.”
Four relatively straightforward penalty attempts fell off target and those 12 points which weren’t gathered proved crucial as Nicolas Sanchez and Emilliano Boffelli took turns in proving even Argentinians can have an off day in front of goal.
As Scotland struggled to get into their usual flow, it was nip and tuck for most of the afternoon thanks to Greig Laidlaw’s kicking before a late Sean Maitland try put Townsend’s side out of sight.
Gilchrist admitted it wasn’t one for the purists but insists it can’t all be about swagger and style.
He said: “When you play in these types of scrappy games and you don’t play at your best you feel like you’ve still won against a strong side.
“You are obviously going to take confidence from that. You can’t just be hard on yourself because sometimes things won’t quite go to plan and it won’t be the kind of rugby we want to play.
“Maybe we were a little bit spooked by what they were doing and thinking too much about the weather conditions.
“We should have backed what we practised through the week. That’s a good lesson going forward.
“There was frustration. We want to play a certain way but the ball was that slippery and Argentina defended really well. There is a bit of relief but you have to take joy out of winning Test matches.
“As soon as we got in the changing room we celebrated a win the same way we always do. Sometimes it’s not pretty but we’re delighted to get a win over a strong Argentina side.”
GRANT GILCHIRST ON BEATING ARGENTINA