Townsend prepares to Russell up a treat with Finn in midfield

FINN Russell will move into Scotland’s midfield to accommodate his former understudy Adam Hastings as Scotland seek to develop a twin play-making facility in their last outing of the year.

After Hastings started the opening match of the autumn campaign when Russell was among the exiles who were unavailable for that match, the partnership was tried out in the closing stages of each of the subsequent matches against Fiji and South Africa after he was introduced as a late replacement in both of those matches.

He now returns, as one of eight players reintroduced to the starting line-up for Saturday’s meeting with Argentina, along with Blair Kinghorn, who comes in on the wing, with Jonny Gray and Hamish Watson the only forwards to retain their places following last weekend’s defeat by the Springboks.

Head coach Gregor Townsend noted that injuries had forced the coaches to consider different options to those they were looking at when the autumn series began, but the eye-catching way the pair combined to take Scotland past the half century mark against the Fijians may well have played its part.

“Adam playing so well for Glasgow this year has put him in a position to compete for that ten jersey,” Townsend contended.

“We want to see Adam to continue to develop and we want to give him opportunities to continue to develop. We believe this week Finn being outside him will help him. We also believe that combination can put Argentina under a lot of pressure. Both through their passing and kicking but also through their running threats.

“I believe it will be an exciting prospect for Adam to start his first game for Scotland at BT Murrayfield. He’ll have two strong communicators either side of him, someone who plays regularly at 10 on his shoulder and someone who has played a lot of matches for Scotland and captained Scotland on a number of occasions inside him.”

Townsend noted that Russell had first emerged as an inside centre at Glasgow Warriors after playing there outside Harry Leonard for the national under-20 side, then putting in some impressive performances outside Dunc Weir.

Since Weir is back in the Scotland squad and has been regularly involved in squads with Russell at Glasgow as well, it seems reasonable to wonder why this has not been tried before, but Townsend reaffirmed that it was Hastings’ form that has forced the issue.

“Finn has always been in excellent form as a ten so we never looked that hard or moving him from there, but Adam has played really well