Townsend on brink if sidekicks fail to spark
GREGOR Townsend has had two goes at getting his backroom staff right. He won’t get a third. Unless his Scotland team do well in the forthcoming Six Nations, he’ll be out of a job at the end of the tournament.
Yes, it’s important that he’s tried to freshen things up by bringing in two new assistants, but the problem is that the changes he has made don’t look dynamic enough to improve results.
The appointment of Steve Tandy as Townsend’s (below) new defence coach isn’t exactly earth-shattering.
To be honest, the other alteration to his staff is rather puzzling.
Tandy replaces Matt Taylor, who has left with immediate effect to join Australia on a four-year deal.
Taylor remains a top coach, otherwise the Wallabies wouldn’t have wanted him, but Scotland had been leaking tries and the players needed to hear a new voice.
Tandy hasn’t exactly been setting the heather on fire with the Waratahs in Australia, where he has spent the last two years as defence coach.
He leaves with the club having finished 12th out of 15 in Super Rugby. Hardly a startling recommendation. Interestingly, the SRU have not revealed the length of Tandy’s contract. It could only last the duration of the Six Nations. If that is the case, it would suggest this could be Townsend’s last time in charge of the national team unless they get at least three tournament wins. Tandy won’t officially meet up with the Scotland players until two weeks before the start of the Six Nations. That is a short window of opportunity to get his message and his strategies across on the training ground. It was a surprising decision to keep forwards coach Danny Wilson for the Six Nations while, at the same time, bringing in Pieter de Villiers as a ‘scrum consultant’ for the Championship. Scotland haven’t had one of those since Massimo Cuttitta left in 2015. South African-born De Villiers earned 69 caps for France, winning four Six Nations titles and appearing at two World Cups. He was a specialist coaching consultant with South Africa between 2012 and 2015 and has also coached at Stade Francais. You would have to think that, with his experience of playing and coaching at international level, he’ll be passing on his knowledge to the whole of the forward pack, rather than just telling them how to scrum. That would make Wilson a peripheral figure for the Six Nations, so why have him around? The one man left officially on a long-term deal in Townsend’s backroom staff will be Mike Blair. He is down as skills coach, which is a catch-all role, and is likely to be working more with Townsend on the Scotland attack going forward. After Taylor’s exit, he will be Townsend’s closest personal ally on his staff.