Blair isn’t fazed by workload
MIKE BLAIR could definitely put his hand up for the title of hardestworking man in Scottish rugby. When Gregor Townsend and his Scotland players have a wellearned break after a three-match summer tour which has taken them to Singapore, Sydney and Suva, coach Blair will manage just a fortnight’s holiday with his family.
After that, the country’s most capped scrum-half starts work again on Dave Rennie’s backroom staff at Glasgow Warriors. From then on, it will be nose to the grindstone for the full ten-month club season.
Blair is the only man within the SRU to combine a role with club and country, but wouldn’t have it any other way — although he jokes that his wife and two children might disagree.
‘It’s pretty full on,’ he said. ‘At the end of a normal season as a club player, or maybe a club coach, you have an excuse to stop working.
‘I would go back to my family, speak to them, take my son to football, speak to my wife, do family things.
‘This time round, I have two weeks off then I’m back for the season. I’ll be with Scotland at our training camp in August, during the autumn Tests and the Six Nations.
‘The rest of the time I’ll be with Glasgow. The opportunity for me to work with Dave Rennie, Jonathan Humphries and Jason O’Halloran at this stage of my coaching career is something I didn’t want to miss.
‘Rugby is what I know, what I did professionally for 15 years. I’d regret not giving coaching a go. I’m loving it at the moment, so we’ll see how it goes.’
Blair has made a seamless transition into coaching. Brought to Glasgow by Townsend on a two-year deal as player-coach, he hung up his boots after a season and spent the next 12 months coaching exclusively at Scotstoun.
He impressed Townsend so much that he was one of his first backroom appointments when he became Scotland boss.
‘The easy bit is getting the opportunity in the first place,’ said Blair (below). ‘The hard bit is to continue to show value. The life of a coach is on a cliff edge all the time, so I have to keep working really hard.’
As well as being a sounding board for Townsend, Blair has specific responsibility for the scrum-halves after winning 85 caps at No 9 despite competing for the jersey with the likes of Chris Cusiter and Rory Lawson. Scotland may not have three worldclass players in that position now but Blair is impressed by what he sees, saying: ‘Greig Laidlaw is away with the Lions, which shows how highly rated he is.
‘We also have Ali Price, who is really talented and has made big progress. He’s been involved a lot this season with Glasgow and Scotland, and has started some really big games for us.
‘Ali has always had it in him to be a top international player. There might be bits and bobs I point out, but he is a smart player who’ll work things out for himself.
‘The more you get used to the international environment, the more you can set the tempo of a game. There are times you have to slow things down and control a game and others when you have to speed it up. Ali knows how to do that now.
‘I’ve also worked a lot with Henry Pyrgos and we have a lot of dialogue about games. He’s great and will take me aside and ask to do an extra ten minutes here and there.
‘I’ve enjoyed working with Sean Kennedy as well on this tour. He’s a really talented player but hasn’t had a massive run of games together. ‘I’d like to have worked more with Sam Hidalgo-Clyne because he looked good for the week he was with us before he got injured. In terms of depth, we’re looking pretty good.’ Blair is not making any predictions about becoming a head coach. For now, he’s still finding his feet. ‘The Scotland boys have been great with me since I arrived,’ he said. ‘Coaching-wise, I wanted to work with the best players and I’ve been fortunate to be given that opportunity. ‘In the role I have, I don’t have to tell people they’ve been dropped and I’m there to help everyone as best I can. ‘As for one day being a head coach, I don’t really know. I’m not sure if that shows weakness in my planning or whether I’m being smart. I just want to see how it goes for now.’