An identity crisis facing rugger lads
An Autumn Test series is always a time for looking out the old corduroy slacks and getting stuck into a superior form of sportswriting.
Covering the oval ball game brings a calm maturity to the job. There’s not the hysteria that accompanies its round ball brother.
But a bit of truth telling is still in order about Gregor Townsend’s 36-man training squad ahead of matches against Tonga, Australia, South Africa and Japan.
Once again, project players, residency rules, kilted Kiwis and ScotBoks is a subject worth tackling.
Here’s a brutal fact to chew over. At the last World Cup, Scotland had the most foreign-born players – a massive 14 in a 31-man squad. Almost half. An eye-popping statistic.
The latest squad is also liberally littered with players who were born outside Scotland and played their sport almost entirely elsewhere before swearing an allegiance to the thistle. It’s a thorny issue.
Dylan Richardson is a point in case. Born in South Africa while capped at youth and Under-20 level for the Springboks, he’s been parachuted into Townsend’s group. To be fair to Richardson, he has a Scottish father.
Prop Pierre Schoeman joins the likes of Duhan van der Merwe, WP Nel, Josh Strauss and Sam Johnson in qualifying through the residency rules, which will be extended from three years to five in December.
This isn’t an argument about nationalism, it’s merely a nod to what is right and proper with regard to who should play for who at international level.
There’s also double standards at play. Who didn’t celebrate Lyndon Dykes’ late winner against the Faroe Islands on Tuesday night?
His tug of war between Scotland and Australia was a result of having parents from Dumfries after playing all his football as a kid Down Under.
Turning a blind eye in a bid to gain a bit of success is nothing new.
It’s doubtful that Scotland’s upturn in fortunes in the Six Nations would be achieved without a dubious Scot or two thrown into the mix.
Picking players who have zero Scottish blood links at the expense of Scottish players bursting a gut to gain that recognition is a danger to the grassroots level of the sport.
Gone are the days of searching for a granny in order to satisfy international qualifying rules and it’s gone too far.