Rome loss will mean arrivederci for Gregor
GREGOR TOWNSEND needs to leave Rome with a victory over Italy on saturday to have any chance of continuing as scotland head coach beyond the six nations — and rightly so.
The SRU would wait until the end of the tournament to sack him but, make no mistake, he would definitely be gone.
defeat is unthinkable against a dreadful Italian side who haven’t won a match in this tournament in five years. Let’s hope it isn’t an omen but their last Championship victory was against scotland at BT Murrayfield back in 2015.
since then, the Azzurri have gone from bad to worse and have now been defeated in 24 six nations matches in a row.
scotland haven’t been much better, of course, and are the one team that the Italians regularly target for a rare win — but losing this one is not an option for Townsend’s side after opening defeats to Ireland and England.
never mind the damaging Finn Russell affair that has made a nonsense of the scotland rugby team branding which declares ‘As One’. That is a side issue, albeit a very big one.
Although Townsend’s handling of that affair is under scrutiny, the former Glasgow warriors head coach needs to be judged on results alone and, frankly, a third straight six nations defeat off the back of an early world Cup exit will signal that it’s time for him to go.
Let’s hope he doesn’t find himself in the position of facing the sack — heaven knows we could do with a couple of positive results to cheer us up after the Russell debacle.
But with the scotland squad he has at his disposal, our results should be better. And the blame for that has to be laid firmly at his door.
Even without the injured Jonny Gray and the exiled Russell, there will be plenty of top-class players wearing the dark blue in the stadio Olimpico this weekend.
The back row in Rome will have Edinburgh team-mates Hamish watson and Jamie Ritchie on either flank. Magnus Bradbury or Matt Fagerson will play no8. That is as strong a unit as any other team has in the six nations.
sean Maitland of saracens is one of the most experienced wingers in Europe and, on his day, can be world class.
Ali Price and George Horne are excellent scrum-halves competing for the starting no 9 jersey and both can provide quick ball. Then there is scotland captain stuart Hogg, who owes his country a good game after the first two matches.
He showed his undoubted class for Exeter Chiefs against Gloucester last Friday night with a try he started from inside his own 22 and ended up finishing under the posts.
It’s time he showed such a flash of genius for scotland after his howlers contributed to the opening two six nations defeats.
Failing to touch down when he was over the try-line proved to be the key moment in the defeat against Ireland in dublin.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, further misery was to come in the Calcutta Cup clash at Murrayfield when he carried the ball over his own line under pressure, leading to the England scrum and try that ultimately won the match for the Auld Enemy.
Overall, it was impossible to work out whether scotland or England played well in that match. The weather conditions were atrocious and the game was always going to be won or lost by a mistake. Unfortunately, it turned on the one by Hogg.
If the extra responsibility of the captaincy is preying on his mind, he has to sort it out — and quickly.
There will surely be no excuses regarding the weather in the Eternal City on saturday, where you would imagine it will be dry enough to encourage running rugby.
Or ‘the fastest rugby in the world’ as Townsend and his team once liked to say before their results took a turn for the worse during the world Cup.
so, for the scotland head coach, all roads lead to Rome. His career depends on it after all.