Rennie afforded ‘wiggle room’ as Edinburgh face squad depth issues

GlasGoW

Munster’s four defeats in Irish inter-pro matches means that Glasgow’s humiliating loss in the first 1872 Cup match is basically irrelevant. The 10win start to the Guinness PRO14 means the Warriors are clearly going to win Conference A and get home-field advantage for a semi-final.

That allows Dave Rennie some wiggle room to address issues in his team which have been uncovered by the Inter-City matches and the European failures. Glasgow are giving up too much turnover ball and far too many penalties which allows their maul defence to come under pressure.

The Warriors have suffered as many – perhaps more – key injuries than most of their rivals. The recent absence of Calum Gibbins has been keenly felt, but perhaps more so Ryan Wilson. The back rower wouldn’t be in anyone’s top five Warriors but his importance to the team and club can’t be overstated.

Rennie has excelled in giving young players opportunities, and he’ll give more of a look to Adam Hastings and George Horne during the Six Nations window. The head coach arrived late but has had four months to stamp his blueprint on the team, and we’ll see a bit more of that in the second half of the season.

eDinburGh

Securing Richard Cockerill for Edinburgh is probably the best pro team signing by Murrayfield in the last few years. Not just because the combative coach has restored respect to Edinburgh, but because they are making far more of a contribution to Gregor Townsend’s national squad.

Cockerill has got Edinburgh to a competitive edge and done so without really adding anyone significant to the squad he inherited from Alan Solomons, all while missing six frontline props and losing two key back rowers to unforeseen disciplinary issues.

He’s been canny and inventive, and he’s trusted in young players when Solomons only played them when forced to.

But they’re still trailing Ulster by some distance in the race for a European qualifying place, and the fixture list is tough in the second half of the season.

One also suspects Edinburgh are more affected by international calls than the Warriors, simply because their internationals are so important to them and they don’t have the depth of the squad at Scotstoun.

There is possible immediate reward in the European Challenge Cup where Edinburgh seem likely to have a home quarter-final and they’re clearly a better team than reached the final of that event three years ago.

And if a full strength Edinburgh reach the final weekend of the season needing to beat Glasgow in the third 1872 Cup game to get into a European qualification play-off, I’d favour them to do it. In one-off games, they’ve already proved they’re more than capable of getting results.