Exiled star can’t dictate culture of the team

STORM CIARA arrived, as forecasted, on Saturday evening and she certainly did her best to disrupt the Calcutta Cup but it would appear to be a mere breeze compared to the storm that is brewing off the field with star player and coach. Finn Russell has had his say and it is clear that this storm is not going to blow out anytime soon. In fact, it is more likely to blow up than blow out. Finn has talked about not having a relationship with Gregor Townsend for the eight years they have worked together at Glasgow and then Scotland. This is very interesting but not altogether surprising. Everyone has looked at these two people and made assessments based on how similar they were as players. They do play in a similar style and both have been very open to try new things and fail when doing so. They both had a great temperament for being an international stand-off; they had strong resilience and always wanted to get better. But they are very different personalities and this is key to their relationship, or lack of one. You don’t need to be friends with a coach but you do need to respect them and I think this is where there is an issue. Russell has gone to Paris and found a team that has a culture that he loves and one that brings out the best in him in his eyes. That is very clear from his performances for Racing 92 this season. But that doesn’t mean this culture and environment is the only way to operate and Townsend is entirely in his right to create a culture and environment that works for Scotland. The players, themselves, set some of the culture especially when it comes to alcohol protocols after the game and it would appear that this is where Russell takes issue with

his coach. One player, irrespective of how good or important he is to the team, cannot set the team culture. He needs to be part of that culture. As a senior player in the leadership group, he would have had his input but then they would have agreed things as a group. I played for Bath, who had a very different culture to Scotland, so when I joined up with the Scotland camp, you adjusted how you operate to fall in line with what was required. No questions asked. Russell has said he wants to play for Scotland again but doesn’t appear to want to compromise what he believes is how a team should operate. This is being played out as a spat between player and coach but it is also a spat between player and the team. Serious talking needs to be done on both sides of these divides to try to find a resolution.