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?