Extra spice for Brown as Warriors host old rivals in season finale
● Hooker says facing club that discarded him adds edge to 1872 Cup showdown
Having failed to make the Pro12 play-offs for the first time in six years, every member of the Glasgow Warriors squad will feel they have a point to prove when they bring the curtain down on a disappointing campaign at home to Edinburgh tomorrow evening.
They will want to send head coach Gregor Townsend and the several stalwart players who are moving on during the summer off on a high; and although the 1872 Cup is a pretty meaningless bauble in the grand scheme of things, it does not sit comfortably with the squad that their neighbours on the east of the country have held on to it these last two seasons.
Then, of course, there is the small matter of staking a claim for a central role in Scotland’s summer tour to Singapore, Australia and Fiji.
And for hooker Fraser Brown, there is an extra edge brought about by the fact that he started his professional career with the capital club, but was discarded six years ago after a series of injuries and operations prevented him playing a single game.
Thrown on the professional rugby scrapheap before his 21st birthday, he went off and worked on the family farm before taking his first tentative steps back into the sport he loves with Heriot’s in the BT Premiership. Glasgow Warriors clearly saw something that Edinburgh had missed and the rest is history.
“I grew up and went to school in Edinburgh. They were my club when I was growing up, and I can’t lie and say that I have fond memories of leaving – but I was welcomed in at Glasgowbygregortownsend, the other coaches and the players, and I love all the staff and the whole culture here. So, I look back on that time and I’m not sore – I’ve moved on – but its not something that I can just let go, there’s always going to be a bit of rivalry there,” he reflects.
“And it’s not just myself, there
0 Fraser Brown left Edinburgh six years ago but says ‘there’s always going to be a bit of rivalry there’.