The Lions - We're Doomed, Doomed I Tell You

WELL - Gartland has spoken, the 2013 British & Irish Lions touring party has been named and I confidently predict: "We're doomed, doomed I tell you".

Everyone who had a try at naming the squad felt Gartland would remain within his comfort zone and pick as many of his Welsh squad as he could get away with. I also felt he was leant-on by the Sky paymasters, with their overwhelming English bias and thus the final squad with 15 Taffs and 10 Ruperts came out.

Only three Scots is a disgrace and, hard though it is to criticise a national treasure: if that's the best we can do - Andy Irvine should, if he will not resign, be de-selected from being the SRU's man on the Lions inside. He did us few favours by agreeing to this squad.

Six Nations form, and even more so Pro12 form ought to have had Ryan Grant nailed-on for the number one jersey in the tests. He's not on the flight, but Matt Stevens is - FFS, Gartland was a front rower and he makes that decision, amazing - he must definitely have taken too-many taps on the head back in NZ.

Against that, big Richie Gray is probably a lucky boy inasmuch as Gartland has selected largely on reputation, but, he has time on his side, unlike Paul O'Connell, who is so-far over the hill as to be practically back on the flat. Big Doncha Ryan must be fuming at seeing the old man on the plane before him, after the season he's had at the touchlines. And what about Rory Best, who has had a brilliant season for both Ulster and Ireland and isn't going - in many ways that's a worse decision than not picking Grant. Watch for Dylan Hartley doing something monumentally stupid in Oz - guaranteed.

Gartland said current club form played a part in his decision-making. If that's really the case, most of the Taffs wouldn't, indeed shouldn't be there - so atrocious has their club form been.

It's a bad squad, badly-selected and, if the Aussies have even half their normal go about them, the Lions will be caned and Gartland's reputation rightly tarnished.

Still, I feel, if we have a good summer series against Japan, Italy and South Africa, the 2014 Six Nations could be good for Scotland - at least we will be less psychologically scarred than the other three nations.

Hurray For Hawick - The Green Machine Is Back

AS ONE brought-up in the heartland of Ayrshire Junior football, I am well aware of how desperate things can get when you have the soul of several wee, close-knit and close-together communities expressed through the local sports teams.

Whilst in overall terms of the game they play, Melrose, Gala, Hawick, Selkirk, Langholm and Kelso are probably a couple of rungs futher up the sporting ladder than Auchinleck Talbot, Cumnock, Glenafton Athletic, Beith, Irvine Meadow and Largs Thistle; I feel the Ayrshire junior football teams could give the Borders rugby teams a head start when it comes to depth of local rivalry, mutual dislike and on-field aggro and still win.

Aye, they take their rugby seriously in the Borders, but not quite as seriously as we take our football here in God's County.

So, I can well understand how they feel at The Greenyards and Netherdale this week, as they consider the return of Hawick to the top flight of the club game. Sadly, because of the needs of the professional game - that old saw about a strong Scottish rugby needing a strong Hawick no longer quite holds true, but, as someone who doesn't have a particular Borders hobby horse to ride, can I welcome the mighty greens back into the top flight and hope they can flourish there.

Their return is doubly welcome, because they have come back with a genuinely Hawick squad of mostly born and bred Terris - other clubs please note. That famed green jersey is, sadly, no longer the be-all and end-all for rugby in the toun; some of the lesser lights have got into the National Leagues, flourished and are we here a bit less-willing to put the Greens first - to the distress of Mansfield rugby. But, the Green Machine is back where it belongs and that is cause for rejoicing.

I HAVE nothing against Jonathan Humphreys, but, must again wonder what exactly a talented Scottish coach has to do to get the call to Murrayfield.

It is not as if the Ospreys pack over recent years has been outstanding. Indeed,  I would reckon the Glasgow pack, which Shade Munro has moulded and which we will learn this week included fewer 2013 British Lions than the opposition, which steamrolled Ospreys at Scotstoun recently, probably showed that, when it comes to forwards coaching, Munro has nothing to learn from Humphreys.

Maybe the SRU was unwilling to break-up the fledgling but successful Townsend/Munro team, but, given the way Welsh and particularly Ospreys forwards seem to blow hot and cold, I don't think the new man is the right one for Scotland.

Time will tell, so, we give him a chance. But, for me, we need more Scots in positions of power at Murrayfield if we are to go places.

THE Lions squad will be announced tomorrow. The pre-release hints are that it will be a largely Welsh squad, with, at most, six Scots chosen. I have said it before and will doubtless end up saying: "I told you so", but, the current Welsh squad is vastly over-rated and to pick the bulk of them will be a disaster.

I think the following Scots should go: Hogg, Maitland, Lamont, Laidlaw, Grant, Murray, Gray, Kellock, Brown and Beattie; and I would put Matt Scott on stand-by.

Kellock would be a superb leader of the dirt trackers, whilst, as the best line-out reader in Europe, he will be worth his weight in gold when it comes to cracking the Aussie codes.

Brown for me, has to go as the best all-purpose back rower in Europe, able to put in a good shift in all three breakaway roles. Again, he brings something extra as a leader.

Of course, if I get six of my ten into the squad, I will think we have done well, but, I reckon there are Scots who would be better tourists than some of the highly-touted Welsh and English players being banded about as shoo-ins.

Decisions, Decisions, Time To Make Some At Murrayfield

JUST what is going on within Murrayfield's corridors of power?

Many long years of experience have taught me that the SRU moves in mysterious ways, its wonders to perform. Back when I was a lad, in the dear departed amateur days, the "alickadoos" who drank the Union's gin and tonic almost relished their antedeluvian image. Dear old Aikman-Smith#s: "This is a rugby international, not a cattle market sir", remark to King George V, when the old stoker enquired as to why, while England's players were numbered, the Scots in a Twickenham international were not was seen as a badge of honour by successive generations of Murrayfield committee-men.

Yet, whilst giving the impression of having been left behind when Noah set sail, the SRU inaugurated short tours, leagues and, lest we forget, the first official substitute was a Scot. Sometimes the SRU gave the image of the Canny Scot lustre.

But, right now - I am perplexed. Glasgow is definitely a fitba city, Edinburgh less so. Of course, this has something to do with the religious/political mix in the former Second City of the Empire, but, Partick Thistle has had not a bad season as well.

BUT - whilst Glasgow has, this season, been naked of Premiership rugby, Edinburgh has had Boroughmuir, Edinburgh Academicals, Heriot's and those uppity suburbanites from Currie all operating at the highest level of the club game. Ergo, the Capital is much more of a rugby city than its larger cousin 50 miles west along the M8.

It doesn't then make sense to have the Warriors as the dominant professional side and it surely makes more commercial sense for the SRU to be looking for ways of getting Edinburgh out of the Pro12 basement and up there alongside Warriors in the attic.

The first step towards this is surely to appoint a new coach. 

It may be that Messrs Scott and Hodge have, in their short spell as caretakers have convinced Murrayfield's Mandarins that they are the pair to do this - I doubt if any ordinary Edinburgh fan is thus convinced. If they have - make their appointments permanent; if not - get the new coach in-situ, quickly.

And I certainly, if I was running a pro team and didn't have my preferred coach in place, would not be buying over the hill Tongan hookers and releasing young Scots, as Edinburgh has done this week.

And while I am on the subject  of releasing young Scots - big Nick Campbell must surely feel used and abused by being released by Glasgow. I am sure he will enjoy life in Jersey, but, having watched him playing for Ayr in the Premiership this season, I feel he could still do a job for Glasgow, whilst learning much from the eight years older Al Kellock - and he's a better lock than some of the guys kept on-board by Edinburgh.

Nick, perhaps like the young Gordon Brown, comes across as: "too nice". But, for me, he's got it for the professional game.

I'd certainly have kept him on and, if I was a high heid yin at Murrayfield, once I'd got my Scottish-born Edinburgh coach in-place, I'd be conducting a major review of playuing resources, designed to get the best out of our Scottish players.

Either Jackson or the now sadly injured Weir has to move to Edinburgh to play every week alongside Greig Laidlaw; propping resources are unevenly skewed towards Glasgow. To be controversial here - might not putting some fire into the bellies of the Edinburgh forwards be a good first step between playing and coaching for Big Al K?

We need answers and action - NOW, from the Mandarins.

PUIR wee Chich. Master Chalmers took what we all hope will only be a temporary leave of Scottish rugby this week as a double loser.

Bad enough to have Ayr snatch the Scottish Cup from his grasp in injury time on Saturday - perhaps worse, given the intercine nature of Borders rugby, to see Gala do much the same in the Border League final.

Still, these two late shocks coming so close together at least gives John Dalziel an inkling of his priority for the new season. He has to get his squad fitter, so they do not again falter in the home straight.

Tired players make wrong decisions - Dalziel has already learned this the hard way.

WHILE I am on the subject of Melrose losing. Many of Scotland's alleged finest rugby reporters are of Borders stock. So perhaps it was a wee bit of native bias which saw them score an own goal on the subject of writing-up Ayr's last gasp winning try at Murrayfield on Saturday.

To a man, the lap top carrying Scottia Nostra pointed out that Robbie Fergusson's scoring pass to Cammy Taylor for the Ayr winning try might have been a trifle forward. Indeed, one or two Ayr men have confided that they thought that too.

So, why did referee Lloyd Linton allow the try?

Perhaps because he was already playing an Ayr advantage for Melrose offside right under the posts. So, it didn't matter if Ayr got a try, or play was brought back for the penalty head-on to the posts. No way would Ross Curle have missed that one and Ayr would still have won; but, better to give the try and get it over with.

The solitary man in the press box to mention advantage was being played was Ron Evans in the Ayrshire Post!!!!

The Stars O Rabbie Burns, Shining Brightly

WE might squabble even more than that lot down in the Borders, and our little local differences make Gala and Hawick seem like bosom buddies - ABA (Anyone But Ayr) is the sub-text to inter-club rivalry in God's County.

But, Saturday was a guid day for the Burns Country, with Ayr completing their league and cup double and Marr winning the RBS Shield. However, THE big result of the day wasn't posted at Murrayfield, but at Kilmacolm, where Cumnock beat Birkmyre to wrap-up the West Division IV league title.

Unbeaten with 15 wins from their 156 games so far, Cumnock have two ambitions left for Saturday's final game of the season, at home to Cowal: the first is to win the game and complete a perfect league season, the second is to score the 48 points they need to average 50 points per game.

If I can round-up enough bodyguards, I just might take-in this game (I've got one or two little local difficulties with fatwas against me in Scumnock).

Of course, Cumnock ought never to have been in that division. That said,. they got out of it in style and hopefully it is now a case of onwards and upwards for a club which has in the likes of el Presidente Jim Morrison and Head Coach Stevie Miller, some great guys.

MEANWHILE, two other of the good guys from the Front Five Club, Ayr Director of Rugby Jock Craig and Marr Captain Stephen Adair's day big Tony, are doubtless still celebrating Saturday's success.

Jock has been a tower of strength around Millbrae these past 50 years. Guys like Auchlin are the backbone of Scottish rugby, whilst there are few as funny or as outgoing in the game as Tony.

Enjoy the days guys.

PERHAPS Craig Chalmers deserved to leave Murrayfield as a winner, but, he didn't. The wee man has long been a gift to journalists, he wears his heart on his sleeve, he occasionally puts his foot in his mouth, but, he cares - deeply - about rugby and about Melrose.

OK, he's maybe his own worst enemy, apparently at the head of a long list of these in the Borders, but, in NOT bringing him inside the Murrayfield professional tent lang syne, I feel various SRU managements have boobed.

I wish him well in Oxfordshire.

Now, surely after guiding Ayr to a league and cup double, Ayr Coach Kenny Murray deserves his shot at the big time. Or will the SRU, whose guiding principle after all is to support and encourage Scottish rugby and Scottish rugby talent, again look for some foreigner as the new Edinburgh coach? Probably aye.

GOOD luck too to another departing weel-kent face, as John Barclay prepares to exchange Glasgow for Llanelli. Well, he'd better be ready for culture shock, the Sospans make your average citizen of Hawick look like a cultured old Etonian.

After nearly a decade at Glasgow, John will be nane the waur o a chinge o air and will, I feel, do well in South Wales.

Welsh Wings Clipped - Gartland Please Note

I HAVE held, since they won the Six Nations, that this current Welsh squad is somewhat over-rated. I still maintain, with a different referee and certainly one who had even the remotest clue about the scrummage, they'd have lost to us at Murrayfield and all this hype about Gartland loading his Lions squad with Welshmen would not be happening.

I appreciate that the particular mental requirements of international football, of whatever code, is important. That said, I would argue that it is far more common for outstanding club players to fail to rise to the bigger occasion than, as is apparently the case with most of the Welsh XV, ordinary club players to suddenly become supermen when they pull-on their national jersey.

But, since coaches tend to belong to the better the devil you know school of thought when it comes to team selection: we can prepare ourselves for a lot of Welshmen in the Lions squad, and a poor series - since the Taffs generally travel as well as Luxembourg wine.

The Welsh big guns in the Ospreys team certainly looked somewhat ordinary as they were gone over by Glasgow last night. Amazing the change a competent Irish referee can make; Glasgow were on Alain Rolland's wavelength to a greater extent than they, or any Scottish team, ever is with the man we all refer to as: "That C*** Clancy".

I particularly liked Mr Rolland's decision to sin-bin Ryan Grant and Adam Jones early in the second half - it cleared up the scrummage, and these two, remember, are the likely Lions Test props.

This might be the answer to the long-standing scrummage problem at the top level. First collapse - general warning; second collapse - ten minutes for the two props on one side of the scrum. If it keeps happening - send off the other two props. I reckon, a couple of games descending to unopposed scrums and we'd be back to good scrumming.

Start binning scrum halves for crooked feeds as well - the job's a good 'un.

Anyway, with their top four slot secured, Glasgow can now get down to the business of guaranteeing a home semi-final and who knows what might happen.

IT'S Finals Day at Murrayfield and, with two Ayrshire teams involved - I am staying well clear. Whether it be senior or junior football, or senior or junior rugby - I've got a 100& record. If I turn up at a final, the team I want to win loses; so, for the sake of Marr and Ayr, I'm doing some jobs about the house for the Bonnie Lass O' Ballochmyle today - but hoping to hear some good news from the capital.

I know Melrose will be fired-up to give that lovely wee man Chick Chalmers a winning send-off. However, Ayr, if they play to anything like known form, ought to complete the league and cup double and, if nothing more, embarrass the SRU, who will continue to ignore Kenny Murray's overwhelming claim to a shot at the professional big time.

Kenny's day job is with an arm of Glasgow DistrictCouncil. If he can navigate that management maze, Murrayfield would be a dawdle.

I am, for once, hoping Marr can make it an Ayrshire double today. Craig Redpath has done a great job there, as has Paul Burke, while skipper Stephen Adair is another good guy. A ken his faither, big Tony - one of the genuine gold-plated characters in Scottish rugby. Whilst, up there in Rugby Valhalla, Big Broon will surely be watching.

Marr has produced more than its share of characters - the Broons, big Cubby, Toad Broon, Arthur Dunsmuir, Tony and Jimmy McGuffie, David Haywood, Robin McEwan, some cracking referees, with a feel for the game; and you always get a warm welcome in the Fullarton club-house.

This club deserves some success.

LAST Saturday, with nothing better to do, I took in a top of the table clash in West Division Four, Cumnock v Bishopton - which is just about as far down the rugby food chain as you can go.

I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, but, one or two things were strange - not least the fact that only one scrum collapsed. If these guys can make: crouch, touch, set work, why cannot our so-called professional stars?

Mind you, some things never change. A Cumnock player was, quite rightly, sin-binned for not retreating ten metres at a penalty, then taking out an opponent. The Cumnock captain and coach, both inquired of the referee if he would be consistent in his punishment of this offence.

"Certainly, next time is also a yellow card," they were told. I know, I overheard the exchange.

So, two minutes later, when the Bishopton number eight, already on a yellow card, does the same - no yellow card, but, a penalty to Cumnock.

Don't you just love referees?

At least the referee made amends right at the death, with a yellow card for the Cumnock try scorer, who had got up from scoring and stuck one on the Bishopton scrum half; who got a straight red card, for having spat on the try scorer.

Had it not been the final play of the game, I'd have left the scrum half on the field, to be dealt with by the Cumnock back row. That would have been painful.

Oh No - It's That Ref Again

YESTRE'EN I sat down in front of my TV to watch the BBC Alba telecast of the Scarlets v Glasgow game from Llanelli. When, in the preamble, I discovered that George Clancy would be the referee, I almost got up and switched off.

Can anybody tell me - has ANY Scottish team ever won a match with Clancy as referee, particularly in Wales?

No, I am not going to blame gorgeous George for Glasgow's loss. The truth is, the Warriord didn't turn-up, but, I warrant, even if they had come out, all guns blazing at their excellent best, they still wouldn't have won.

I have long held that the Welsh cheat to an amazing degree; and have to admit the do it very well; but, having an official who lets them get away with it as readily as George does, certainly helps.

George spotted every Glasgow offence, but only about every tenth Welsh one. It cannot help a team's confidence if they know: "They've just done that and got away with it - if we try that, we'll get pinged". Another biased display from Clancy fair ruined my night.

MELROSE Sevens today and good luck to the Borders club. Being a fully-paid-up member of the Front Five Donkeys Club, I have never got sevens; it goes against the grain. I've never been to Melrose Sevens, although I hear it is a great day out, but, I suppose, at heart I'm a 15s man through and through.

I was a wee bit pissed-off at the BBC preview on Reporting Scotland last night, Cameron Buttle buttling away from the ground, then a clearly foonert Judith Ralston giving the weather forecast from there.

What did that one-off little exercise cost them? Maybe, if the BBC Scotland sports team would come out of the pockets of the SPL and Celtic and remember that SPORT is more than poor-quality football, they'd get on a bit better.

Any bets next Saturday's National finals day at Murrayfield will pass without mention on Reporting Scotland?

I SEE Gavin Hastings, protecting his nice little HSBC Ambassador earner has just picked his Lions Test XV, with but a single Scot, big Richie Gray, included.

Such XVs, which have been bombarding us since the Autumn Tests, are a waste of time and a sure sign of slack journalism and a lack of ideas on sports desks. Gavin and all the other former stars who hold ambassadorial roles are duty bound to pick their XVs, but, these guys surely know better than anyone - nobody forecasting now will correctly guess the Lions team which takes the field for the First Test - not even Russell Grant and Mystic Meg, since there is always at least one unforeseen injury and a couple of "bolters" (dirt-trackers who come through to win a place) when the real team is finally chosen.

A Huge Blow For A Huge Talent

I MUST admit, until last month I hadn't noticed young Alex Allen. All that changed, however, after I took-in the Scotland v Ireland Club XVs international at Millbrae, during which the Edinburgh Accies prop stole the show and easily won the Man of the Match award.

Here was an exciting young Scottish prop forward, whose progress I looked forward to monitoring. I was delighted when he won one of the two McPhail Scholarships, to spend this summer in New Zealand, along with another worthy recipient of the honour, Ayr and Glasgow Warriors fly half Finn Russell.

Now, sadly, a training injury will prevent Alex from travelling to the Land of the Long White Cloud. I wish him a speedy and full recovery and look forward to seeing him one day replace his Club XV caps with full ones.

SPEAKING of Finn Russell - he will, when he returns from New Zealand be nane the waur o another season with Ayr; next season's British and Irish Cup games will be good experience for him. However, with Messrs Jackson and Weir, not forgetting the under-rated Scott Wight ahead of him at Warriors, he could be a long time gestating.

There is an imbalance in playing resources in some positions between Edinburgh and Glasgow, I think everyone, even the Murrayfield Mandarins recognise this and, once the most-pressing vacancy - Head Coach at Edinburgh - is filled, there surely has to be some in-house trading between the two profesional squads, to give both a better chance of success next season.

This will be a tough one for the men at the top to work out. The Edinburgh squad clearly needs strengthening, but, this cannot wholly be done at the expense of Glasgow, who deserve every chance to build on this season's marvellous Rabo Pro12 form.

At least, the SRU's management model, for all its flaws, is clearly better than the Welsh one, as witness the George North contract row.

I WELCOME the proposed Scotstoun match between the Kings of the Sevens - the top team over the Borders circuit and the Legacy Sevens leaders - a sort of Sevens Second Division.

I still feel, however, the SRU has never worked out a proper strategy for the abbreviated game we invented. With Sevens set to become an Olympic sport in Rio, there is just a chance that, as has happened with 50-overs and Twenty-20 cricket, the short form of the game - given global exposure, could become more-popular.

This eventually will surely happen, unless, for starters, the IRB sorts out the scrum - it goes without saying.

I have long felt the SRU could have made Sevens more-popular, by initiating a proper, national sevens league. However, this would cut right across the long-established Borders circuit, and, we cannot offend the Borderers now, can we?

April In Scotland - Could Be Interesting For Our Rugby

APRIL - traditionally the lost month of the Scottish rugby season, since the SRU have never managed to square the circle of Sevens v Fifteens in this month which should be ideal for running rugby.

Most, if not all the leagues have been settled, whilst Melrose, for so-long one of our top clubs will be centre stage, between the Melrose Sevens and their appearance in the RBS Scottish Cup Final, at Murrayfield, on 20 April.

This promises to be a cracking match, Melrose v Ayr (again), with the men from the Greenyards clearly anxious to send Chick Chalmers away a winner, and thereby paper over the considerable cracks of this season.

Wee Chick has enemies - of that there is no doubt; however, when it comes to being Chick's worst enemy, nobody can do this as well as the man himself.

Chick's departure will mean big close-season decisions for his successor, John Dalziel, as he sets out to re-cast, rejuvenate and reinvigorate the Melrose squad for next season. He will surely wish to start off with a team which has shown it is capable of winning the big prizes.

However, Ayr will be no pushovers. With the Premiership title already wrapped-up, they will be desperate to add the Cup in a double-winning season.

Ayr face a difficult close season. There can be no doubting the men they recruited from relegated Glasgow Hawks at the start of the season: the Gossman brothers, Dean Kelbrick, Peter Jericevich and the two Warriors who were moved to Ayr from Old Anniesland - George Hunter and Nick Campbell all played significant roles in Ayr's season.

How many of these Glasgow-based players will revert to Hawks, now the Glasgow club has battled back into the top league? Will some go, might they all return - or, will Ayr's British & Irish Cup place mitigate against staying in Glasgow?

Then there is the position of coach Kenny Murray. He, even more than George Graham at Gala, has surely earned a crack at coaching a professional club; maybe not as Head Coach at Edinburgh, but surely as at least an assistant or specialist coach.

Murray inherited a competitive squad from Craig Redpath, who deserves credit for getting his new club Marr to Finals Day at Murrayfield by the way; but, he has since taken Ayr up a level.

If he gets the professional call - who will take over? If he doesn't, can he persuade the Glasgow gang to remain at Millbrae, and can he continue to keep Ayr going forward - or will the same voice, shouting the same things, week after week, finally pale?

Yep, Finals Day, and the aftermath, will be very interesting and I can guarantee, this summer, we will have more than the Lions in Australia, to keep us talking.