What better way to start back than with a derby match? I was so fired up for the derby that I wanted to knock Jim Hamilton’s head off. Luckily, I missed
AL KELLOCK never took a backwards step in a derby match. Whether he was playing for Edinburgh or Glasgow Warriors, it was the fixture he looked forward to most.
He lived and breathed it so much that, when he was Glasgow captain, he made his team-mates pin a picture of their opposite number on the gym wall just to fire them up while they were lifting weights.
Invariably, the man who would be staring back at him was Edinburgh’s Jim Hamilton.
‘We’re both involved in Premier Sports’ coverage of the derby on Saturday and we’re good mates,’ Kellock tells Sportsmail. ‘But back then in the run-up to the matches, and during them, I’m sure he would have had me in his sights as much as I had him in mine.
‘His picture used to go up on the wall to remind me who I was against and to keep up my aggression and keep me in the mood for the game.
‘We would all lift our weights and come up and stare at the guy we were going to be playing against. We didn’t do that for other teams, just Edinburgh. It mattered that much.
‘If Jim wasn’t playing, it would be a picture of somebody else. I wasn’t alone in doing that. We all wanted to see our direct match-day opponent and always have them in our minds, trying to work out how to get the better of them.
‘Our training session also went up a notch in derby week. We all used to really bash each other up. You could feel the intensity rising the closer it came to game day.’
His head-to-heads with Hamilton, both of them a towering 6ft 8ins and both competing for a starting Scotland place at the time, were never to be forgotten. No quarter was asked nor given, with tempers boiling over more than once.
Kellock’s recollections of those battles between two of the toughest men in rugby are certainly not for the faint-hearted.
Looking back on one occasion in particular when the pair came to blows, he admits: ‘We knocked lumps out of each other in derby matches. I threw a punch at him in a game at Firhill which, looking back, was probably not too clever.
‘We’d been beaten by Edinburgh the week before and my intention was to knock his head off, I was so fired up. I got away with it because I missed and just scuffed the top of his head.
‘It would have been a red card straight away if I had connected but thankfully maybe refs were a wee bit more lenient back then.
‘It boiled over a few other times, too, and I remember when Chris Fusaro, who isn’t the biggest, got sent off for fighting with Scott MacLeod of Edinburgh, who is taller than me.
‘Chris Paterson, when he played for Edinburgh against us, tried to convince me it was better to treat it as just another game and not to let the emotion get to you. I was having none of it and still don’t to this day when the topic comes up with Chris.
‘Maybe some of the Edinburgh players could think like that as, to be honest, they were the dominant team back then maybe ten years or so ago. When I played for Edinburgh against Glasgow, I took it very seriously and went all out to win. But when I was at Glasgow taking on Edinburgh, it was maybe a bigger deal because I was captain in derby games for so many years. I loved the occasion, getting up for the game and taking them on. I am sure nothing has changed in the Glasgow dressing room since my day.’
Kellock certainly has a different vantage point on the occasion now from his position as an analyst in the commentary booth.
This one is going to feel a whole lot different, not least because of the absence of fans at BT Murrayfield as coronavirus continues to spread its cloak of gloom around the world.
However, as he looks forward to the first of the back-to-back Pro14 derby matches tomorrow, Kellock believes the empty stands and subsequent lack of atmosphere will make very little difference to the outcome. Particularly in a game where the players remain just as passionate about winning as he did.
‘This is a derby, so all the players will be totally focused, fans or no fans,’ he insists. ‘There will be no energy in the empty stadium apart from the energy created by the players, so they need to take charge of the situation.
‘They all need to be vocal because they won’t have an atmosphere to bounce off.
‘It can’t be just one voice, not just the captain.
‘You have to spread it round and every player on that park needs to motivate the other. You need to build up momentum by encouraging your team-mates.
‘In the empty stadium, you might see water carriers and coaches being a bit more guarded over how they get their messages on because the opposition will be able to hear them.
‘The ref will be able to hear a lot more and get a better understanding of how the players see it.
‘Having no fans there will make a difference from a commentary point of view for me because I reckon I will be able to pick up more of what is said and get a better mindset over what is going on.’
Kellock jokes that he runs the risk of getting splinters from sitting on the fence when asked who he expects to win. ‘Ordinarily I would give you a pick but there is no form guide,’ he says.
‘Neither side has played for five months and things have changed in that time. It’s all about who hits the ground running best after such a long lay-off.
‘Both teams have some new players in their ranks and have lost others. For instance, Richie Gray is likely to be involved for Glasgow while Edinburgh have lost the likes of John Barclay. It’s impossible to give a confident prediction on this one because of these factors.
‘Yes, Edinburgh have more to play for than Glasgow and just need a point to make the play-offs. On the flip side, this is Danny Wilson’s first game in charge of Glasgow and all his players will be out to impress him.
‘A lot of these derby games are not free flowing. They are won at the breakdown, won at the set-piece, and I don’t expect this to be any different.
‘Simply having professional rugby back in Scotland is great news after such a long time away. To be talking about the sport again is fantastic and what better way to start back than with a derby match?’