Tight five the key for Scots in setting platform to let our strike runners loose

HE Scotland team selected by Vern Cotter for tomorrow’s game against France is the one that I and probably a lot of other people expected. I feel sorry for Mark Bennett, who has been left out of the squad altogether despite not doing a huge amount wrong, but at the same time I’m extremely pleased that Alex Dunbar is back in the team after battling against injury for the past year.

Alex has demonstrated his real quality in his recent outings for Glasgow Warriors, and he and Duncan Taylor will make a good physical partnership at centre – something that will be very necessary given the way I expect the French to play at BT Murrayfield. Duncan has massively impressed me with the way he has been playing for Scotland, and the way he took his try against Wales showed what a quality runner he is.

Alex will also bring a directness to the play that I think we’ll need against France. He and Josh Strauss, who is the other change to the starting line-up from the team that beat Italy a fortnight ago, have a big role to play in taking the game to the French. They are two guys who can get the ball and go forward, and that’s something we’re going to need against opponents who are likely to try and impose their physicality on the match right from the start.

Josh was absolutely outstanding for the Warriors in the home win against Munster last month, and is a very similar player to David Denton, who has missed out this time because of injury. At their best, both men ensure the team is always picking up momentum and going forward.

Ryan Wilson is back on the bench, having swapped places with Josh after starting in Rome two weeks ago. Similarly to Mark Bennett, he didn’t do anything wrong, but he is quite similar to John Barclay and John Hardie, the other two members of the back row. With Josh in the side there’s a good balance to the back row, and as Ryan can cover all three positions he is sure to come on at some stage.

While the back row will have a significant role to play in gaining the upper hand at the breakdown, the key to victory, as ever, will rest with the front five.

As I said, I believe France will try to be as physical as possible, and standing up to that challenge will be vital. Our front five have been outstanding in that respect in recent matches, and another solid performance from them can provide Scotland with the platform they need to bring their attacking game into play.

As anyone who has seen France play over the years will tell you, they are capable of doing a lot more on a rugby pitch than just barging into people. But the more creative play that they are able to produce can only come about if and when a team has a degree of dominance up front. If they try to play too much rugby in their own half, off poor ball, the pressure on them will be enormous.

From Scotland’s point of view, the aim will be to achieve the reverse of that and provide good ball for the backs to run on to. That means getting the ball on the front foot and continually moving forward. If they can do, and get the backs running as they did against Italy, a significant battle will have been won.

I’m not suggesting that they will be relaxed, exactly – it will probably be far too taxing an afternoon for that – but they should certainly have the confidence to play the brand of rugby that suits them best.

That was the style they showed in beating Italy in Rome a fortnight ago, as well as in spells in the defeat by Wales. It was also in evidence at the Rugby World Cup, while the last time they showed it at BT Murrayfield was when they beat the Italians by a fair margin in the World Cup warm-up match last summer.

There is no question France are still an enormously talented team, but we are good enough to win. It starts with the front five, but we also need to play good rugby and get our back three into the game.

I would say that the contest in the front five will determine whether we win or lose, and the performance of the back three will decide how many points we win or lose by.

The key point is that we are looking for a similar quality that the team showed a fortnight ago.

Will France be harder opponents than Italy were? Probably. Can Scotland play better than they did then? Definitely.