Scottish Rugby Dancing explained: Two Steps Forward, A Wee Stumble, A Nimble Side Step, Another Stumble - Repeat

THERE IS maybe an excellent reason why Scotland is not home to the world's most-exciting roller coaster. Any thrill produced by riding that machine would be insignificant in comparison to the ups and downs, the exhilarating highs, the gut-wrenching lows, of following Scottish sport. And if Rugby Union Football is your game of choice, well, the dips and rises simply get more-extreme.

Take the weekend just passed. It began at an eerily-empty BT Murrayfield, and an eight tries to one win over Georgia. Given our propensity for slipping on banana skins, this was a better result than we maybe expected. Sure, we were confident we could win, but, maybe not that well.

However, in the time-honoured tradition of Scottish rugby, that positive forward step was followed by a wee bit of a stumble, as Glasgow lost to Ospreys, in Swansea. OK, both sides were shorn of their top talent by the international weekend, but, even in Wales, we now expect Warriors to be too-good for that particular Welsh region.

Things perked-up slightly when, aided by an organisational blunder which left their opponents to play out the final quarter of the game a player short, Scotland's Women, drew with the higher-ranked France,

at Scotstoun.

It was a pity the girls could not have snatched victory, but, interim coach Bryan Easson will surely be happy with the manner in which the girls stuck to their task and got some kind of reward. It is now a case of turning such draws into victories. Let's hope they can keep going forward, next time out, against Wales.

However, the feel-good factor of Sunday afternoon had evaporated by supper time as Edinburgh lost narrowly at home to Connacht. At least, they managed to win the second-half. However, this was Edinburgh's sixth straight defeat and, sadly, just as winning is a great habit to get into, serial losing is one which requires urgent attention.

But, perhaps the most-enjoyable game of the weekend, from a Scottish point of view, was watching the considerable contributions of Messrs Hogg, Skinner, Gray and Hidalgo-Clyne to Exeter's Gallagher Premiership win at Twickenham.

Given a rare day off from starting duties, it was cheering to see Jonny Gray come off the bench and make that crucial line-out steal at the death. It also says much about the standing of Hoggy, that Wasps' game plan was entirely aimed at keeping the ball as far away from him as possible, and limiting the chances he had to unleash havoc with his broken field running.

LOOKING at the bigger picture of Scottish Rugby, and with a nod to what happened at the week-end, I wonder if perhaps we have got our management model somewhat muddled.

OK, caveats:

• These are not “normal” times

• We do not know when, if ever, we will get back to “normal”

• Or if the new “normal” will be the same as the old “normal”

Let's assume:

• We relatively-quickly get a vaccine against Covid-19

• The pandemic, if not entirely eliminated, becomes controllable

• We return to being able to fill stadia to watch our sport

What happens then?

Let's assume again – at least in the case of the SRU, we carry-on as before:

• The international team remains our major income generator and the show case for Scottish rugby talent

• The two full-time professional sides, playing in the PRO14 are the teams from which the national squad is mainly drawn

• The Super6 is the tier of rugby in which the main player development is done

• The club game should be community-based, strictly amateur and intended to provide something best expressed by a wee change to the name of yon Hawick team: a Pleasant Saturday (rather than Sunday) Afternoon.

If we take these as the broad outlines of how we run the game, we can put in place the right management plan.

• We settle on a way we want to play the game

• We put in place the best SCOTTISH coaches to get us playing that way

• We insist all our SRU-funded teams play within that pattern

• We pro-actively encourage and nurture Scottish talent (both playing and coaching)

As things stand, Scotland cannot be relegated from the Six Nations. The two pro teams cannot be relegated from the PRO14. There is no relegation from the Super 6. Therefore, while winning is always to be encouraged, in the case of league games during international windows, the club coaches can safely take selection risks.

We really need to be, I feel, a wee bit less concerned with short term points gains and more with longer-term player development gains during the international windows.

Of course, at the end of the day, a lot of such planning comes down to us being better at talent-spotting in young players, and an awful lot better in how we nurture and develop that talent once we have spotted it. For me, that has been the SRU's big weakness throughout the “professional” era.

We don't have as-many players to work with, so, we need to be a lot smarter in how we handle that talent.

It's well past time we got things right, we've been getting things wrong for most of the past 25 years.