Lamont does not want to miss a thing

THE FLESH has undoubtedly been weakened by his full 80-minute outing on day one. But the spirit? Don’t even think about questioning it. ‘There is nothing the coach could say to persuade me to voluntarily sit this one out — there is no way I’m sitting it out, no way I want to miss a minute!’ said Sean Lamont, grinning like a schoolboy, rather than a 34-year-old veteran now two appearances short of his 100th cap. ‘Sometimes the body takes a bit longer to recover these days, I’ll admit that, but it’s only natural. But I still enjoy it.

‘And I’m a competitive old b****r! I’ll keep sticking in. This is what it’s all about, flogging yourself until there’s nothing left in the World Cup. It’s a special competition.

‘If I’m called upon, I will do my best. I’ve always said that I love playing for Scotland, especially back at the World Cup, when the stakes are so high.

‘It’s still as fresh to me now as it was when I won my first cap. For me, the enjoyment is still there and that’s a big part of it.

‘We know what we’ve got to do. It’s just about hitting the recovery markers. After that, we target America — and look for another five points.’

Now there’s a statement of intent from the old greybeard in the group. Never mind just beating the opposition. He wants four tries and another bonus point to go with the full fivepoint haul f rom the opener against Japan.

Lamont’s confidence in Scotland’s ability to achieve such a comprehensive win over the USA is based not on some swaggering arrogance but, rather, an under- standing of how much room there is for improvement.

‘Getting the bonus point against Japan was important but we’re still a fairly long way from being happy,’ he admitted. ‘There are a lot of things we can do better, a lot of things we need to do better.

‘But full credit to Japan. They really came at us and, with the way they played, you can understand how they beat South Africa. We had done a lot of research on them, though, and we’d really been building towards that first game all summer.

‘If you want to win the pool, you have to win your first game. So we’re pretty happy to have done that, to have bagged all five points, even though we have a fair bit to work on.

‘And America will be coming at us, we know that about them. We have to treat them with the same respect we showed Japan because, if anything, they’re even more physical and hard to handle.

‘The tricky thing now is the fourday turnaround, we all know that. Recovery i s key, getting all the recovery you can.

‘It’s about eating right, resting right — right after the Japan game we were travelling straight to Leeds, so it was hit-and-run, get the job done and focus on the next job. ‘The plan was to have a quick review of the game on Wednesday ni ght or first t hi ng Thursday. But the main thing is recovery.

‘We’ve got a good squad, as well, so I’m sure the boss will be looking to rotate players and freshen things up.’

Just as long as he doesn’t rotate his gaze in the direction of Lamont, who played in all four World Cup warm- up matches, including the full 80 minutes in each of the first three games, the old man in this youthful squad will be content.