It Worked In Hungary - Why Not In Scotland

I HAVE long understood that the basic clannishness of the Scots means we seldom make the best of our limited, but stretched resources, particularly in sport.

For instance, when the Hungarian Communist government decided, in around 1950, to bring a particularly-gifted squad of players together in one national "Superclub", so they could play together week-in, week-out and thus perform better when they put on the national scarlet strip, they faced a couple of problems.

 

The obvious club to base this new superclub on was Fernecsvaros, the top Hungarian club of the time. But that club didn't meet the idealogical doctrine of the regime. MTK Budapest, the next possible club was likewise disqualified, but for different idealogical reasons, so they picked a third club, Kimset, which became Honved - "the people's club".

 

This was the club of Puskas, Boczik, Grocsics etc - the rest is history.

 

Imagine if a Scottish government had tried something similar. Obviously, for the same, different reasons, Celtic and Rangers, even Hearts and Hibs would have been ruled-out, so Partick Thistle might well have become our superclub. I know, it makes no sense.

 

But, take the superclub concept into rugby, and we have what happened when the game went professional. OK, the SRU managed to much it up big time, but, I suggest, having our betterScottish players playing week-in, week-out, SHOULD have been good for Scottish rugby.

 

Why hasn't it? How long do you have for all the reasons?

 

Let's just leave it. I suppose a totalitarian SNP government, post-independence, might do a North Korea and close the border with England, keeping all our best rugby players at home and giving them a standard of living way above the rest of the population. Allowing them to play for Edinburgh and Glasgow in the Pro12 and for Scotland and in the process producing a World Cup-winning team which rolls over Saxon and All Black alike, pulverises the Paddies, whacks the Welsh, F***s the Frogs, tobers the Tallies, stuffs the Saffers, obliterates the Ockers and annihalates the Argies, while doing a good Krakatoan impression on the poor Pacific Islanders. But, I am not holding my breath on that one.

 

We really ought to be able to produce two good, competitive professional teams, capable of winning in professional club  rugby and providing us with an international side which can compete with the very best. Or is it, as is often suggested, that there is something in the Scottish psyche, which prevents us from winning at team games, for all the good individual sportsmen and women we produce?

 

I know Glasgow are going well at least in the Pro12 and can accept that they got a bad draw, for the stage in their development they are at, in this season's Heineken Cup. But, whatever is going wrong at Edinburgh, it needs sorting out, quickly.

 

 

 

ALLAN Massie had a good piece in Saturday's Scotsman, in which he wondered at the quality of the imports recruited by Edinburgh this season. I couldn't agree more. I feel, perhaps, time is running out for Michael Bradley at Murrayfield.

 

Apparently Brian Redpath is heading for the exit at Sale..........

 

That said, one hears that wee Chic's jacket is on a shoogly nail at the Greenyards..........

 

A wee home-coming, perhaps in an advisory role to Chalmers, followed, after a short but suitable period of time, by a call to Murrayfield. I wonder, might this be a goer?

 

 

 

SPEAKING of Melrose's current inability to win at home, which has all but taken them out of the RBS Premiership title reckoning. This shows what a terrific competition the Premiership has quickly become.

 

I watched Ayr beat Boroughmuir on Saturday and this game was a lot tighter than the result might indicate. 'Muir are languishing in the league basement, but they are a lot better than their results might indicate. They have some terrific young forwards, plus the great experience of Sean Crombie and Ali Davidson and they gave the Ayr pack a good going-over.

 

However, in the end, the pace of the Ayr backs won the day, but it was a terrific game and typical of an under-rated competition. Come on SRU, I know you've got most of your eggs in the pro teams basket, but, the Premiership is a brilliant competition, well worth talking-up. DO SO.

 

 

 

 

Two More Good Guys Gone

THIS has been a sad week for those of us who have been a long time in the game, with the deaths of All Blacks legend Sir Wilson Whineray and Hawick and Scotland legend George Stevenson.

 

I belong to the school of thought which dictates that a star in one era would have been a star in any era; this is a basic add-on to the belief that while form might be transitory, class is permanent and both Whineray and Stevenson oozed class and charisma.

 

I was speaking to one of the current leading men in green and he put it well, suggesting that Geordie was well-nigh uncoachable. He did things off-the-cuff and instinctively, the very antithesis of the sort of playing by numbers which is such a big part of present-day professional rugby.

 

The way Stevie and the smaller and lighter Eddie McKeating of Heriot's repeatedly went in low, like navy blue torpedoes, to repeatedly sink the bigger John Gainsford and Iain Kirkpatrick, their Springbok opposite numbers, during the Murrayfield international of January, 1961 is one of my abiding memories of those school trips through to the internationals.

 

On paper, Scotland had no chance, but, we gave the 'Boks a game and a fright and much of that was down to the two centres.

 

Although they were international contemporaries, Stevenson and Whineray never faced each other on the national stage. Stevie was not chosen for the 1959 Lions Tour to New Zealand and he was out of selectorial favour when Whineray's marvellous All Blacks were held to a 0-0 draw at Murrayfield in 1964 - the closest Scotland has yet come to beating the world's best team.

 

 

 

TO A centre of lesser class. Ayr's Ross Curle has been suspended for six weeks, following his second red card of the season, at Currie a couple of weeks ago. I think he got off lightly, compared with the old days when the SRU used to hand down draconian sentences for the most-innocuous of crimes.

 

Six weeks, Curle got off lightly, but not half as lightly as he did on the day. Ayr coach Kenny Murray apparently went through him. Just as well Ayr Director of Rugby Jock Craig was at the game, or Curle might be missing two "male brain cells" by now.

 

 

 

WITH the best part of a full XV not considered due to various injuries, there were no surprises in the 34-strong squad Andy Robinson named for the forthcoming All Blacks game, the first of the three autumn tests.

 

There were whispers that, just maybe Clermont Auvergne's Mark Bennett might be called-up for the Autumn test squad. If I was the SRU I wouldn't hang around too-long before securing young Mark for the national side - before he qualifies for France on residency grounds.

 

Get him into at least the A squad for the Six Nations, or risk losing him.

Things Can Only Get Better - I Hope

WOE, woe and thrice woe are we. After the Heineken Cup hammering of Edinburgh at Munster, a defeat which came hard on the heels of their Saracens shaming, things are looking black for Scottish rugby.

 

Glasgow's losses to Northampton and Ulster were (slightly) more acceptable. They are in a tough group, but may yet at least beat Castres and the Saints at Scotstoun; Edinburgh could be in for a few more bum skelpings further down the track.

 

For me, equally galling were the British & Irish Cup defeats suffered by the Premiership sides. I know, from seeing them at Ayr last season, that Llandoverey are a good side, but I didn't expect them to win at the Greenyards for instance.

 

A series of losses, such as at the weekend, is not good for the national feel-good factor, with the Autumn internationals looming. Andy Robinson will name his squad this week, it will be interesting to see who he calls up, because we badly need a boost and he has several selection issues to resolve, not least with a few key men injured. I can see one or two surprise selections being revealed.

 

 

 

AYR coach Kenny Murray praised the SRU at the weekend, for their new initiative whereby, in RBS Premiership games, the two coaches have listening-in access to the match officials' feed - the means whereby the referee and his two assistants communicate during games.

 

The coaches therefore know what on-field events are getting to the officials; they now know immediately, if say one of their back row players gets a yellow card at the breakdown - why the card was produced. They also, should have been aware that the card was coming, from the referee's inter-play with the men with the flags.

 

"I think it's a great advance", said Murray.

 

I wonder if the SFA might think of trying this in football - it might stop a few stooshies in that game.

 

 

 

SCOTLAND'S top rugby referees are not currently represented at the very highest level. We don't have a current successor to the likes of Alan Hosie or Jim Fleming taking charge of the really big internationals.

 

But, hope is at hand. Johnny Bacagalupa - former law-bending loose-head prop turned law-upholding referee and now one of the SRU's top referee talent spotters is convinced that we have a handful of young turks coming through the ranks who are going right to the top of the whistler ranks.

 

Murrayfield spends a lot of time and money encouraging young refereeing talent, which is a very good thing. Dislike them, or loath them - without referees we cannot have a game and if players have to sclamber up a greasy pole to reach international level, it is nothing to the obstacles in the way of aspiring referees.

 

A contemporary of mine, who only quit refereeing when he turned 65, is now one of the SRU's young referee mentors and he had a horrific tale last week of mentoring one young charge who was given a second XV league match between two West of Scotland teams.

 

If we take full internationals as Level One - this was about Level 14, 30 basically unfit guys working-up a thirst. Yet the young referee, who was doing his level best was subjected to relentless abuse from the touchlines and dumb insolence and worse from the players.

 

My mate has given both clubs a dire report, which he hopes Murrayfield will act upon, otherwise, the shortage of referees which currently exists will worsen somewhat in years to come.

 

Referees, in any sport, probably love the game more than the players, but are repaid with abuse - it has to stop.

The End of The Beginning - Now Let Battle Commence

THE week-end just passed was, to borrow a phrase from Winston Churchill: "the end of the beginning" - of season 2012-13. The Pro12 and the RBS Premiership will now yield precedence to the Heineken and British & Irish Cups.

 

So, before this change of emphasis, we should perhaps run a State of the Nation type posting. In the professional game, Glasgow, particularly after that fine win over Cardiff on Friday night, will go into the HC in better shape than Edin burgh.

 

OK, there were mitigating circumstances surrounding their loss to Treviso on Friday night - not least an Italianreferee, apparently appointed courtesy of a bit of interference from the Mafia - if you read between the lines; but, that said, good teams, particularly at home, always have ways of taking an incompetent referee out of the equation - although, for some unfathomable reason, this has long proved problematic to Scottish teams.

 

Must Do Better - a LOT better, will surely be wee Michael Bradley's message to his troops this week.

 

A couple of seasons ago, when his name was first being mooted as a ptoential Glasgow recruit, I watched Mike Cusack come second to Gordon Reid, then with Ayr full time, in a B&I Cup tie. I thought then, Glasgow were chasing the wrong prop. However, the two were subsequently signed by the club and today, with Reid's case being helped by Jon Welsh's long-term absence, they have elbowed their way past three four internationalists to be Warriors' two first-choice props.

 

They were particularly effective in Cardiff, with Cusack fully deserving his Man of the Match award and Reid not far behind in a display which totally over-powered the Cardiff tight unit. Of course, props cannot win the bump and grind battle unaided and maybe it is now time to bury, once and for all, that old chestnut about Al Kellock not being a good scrummager.

 

The way the Glasgow pack has worked this season has surely also boosted Shade Munro's standing as a forwards coach, and, while I'm being gracious, the big bearded Saffer in the back row looked a much-better player in Cardiff than he had in Scotstoun the previous week.

 

However, Glasgow's old nemesis of passes not sticking in the red zone, was again evident in Cardiff - but, at least they are creating chances, which, they will soon be taking regularly. I feel they could have a good HC this season.

 

 

 

IN THE  Premiership, Ayr continue to lead - seven from seven so far, which is great for them. They travel to Currie on Saturday and this will be their biggest test yet, particularly with Peter Jerecevich absent on Scotland Sevens duty.

 

This battle of the "New Firm" will not, on its own, settle the Premiership title; however, if Ayr can keep winning - they will become increasingly difficult to peg back over the remainder of the season. This game deserves a big crowd at Maleny Park.

 

The B&I Cup teams' fortunes may well come down to which professionals are available to them. Gala and Melrose are perhaps, on domestic form, the most-likely to threaten towards the knock-out stages of the competition, Dundee and Stirling County will have to climb a few more rungs of the ladder from where they currently are if they are to make an impact.

 

 

 

I HAD a bit of a rant during the Cardiff v Glasgow game, when the referee sent the Halfpenny try or no try decision to the TMO. He ruled, correctly, that Stuart Hogg's brilliant cover tackle had seen him push the ball out of Halfpenny's grasp and into touch-in-goal.

 

The decision to award Cardiff the put-in to a Scrum Five was therefore, the correct one - I just felt, the TMO ended up making a decision which he wasn't asked to make. Or am I being pedantic? I can see, somewhere down the line - please, please, let it be in a crucial Calcutta Cup decision which goes Scotland's way - the TMO making a huge, match-turning decision, which will unleash all kinds of argument about what ought and ought not, be referred "upstairs".

 

A wee bit more thought and guidance would not go wrong, even if, on the whole, anything whbich helps-out the poor bloody ref is to be applauded.

 

 

 

I WATCHED the Leeds v Warrington Rugby League Grand Final on Sunday. The very good BBC coverage was spoiled, yet again, by the prattling of the ubiquotous Jonathan "Piles" Davies. But I had to laugh at one point when he - a former Warrington player - squealed about a Leeds forward pass not being called.

 

If there is one thing the Welsh do know about it is forward passes - seeing as they make them so often nowadays.

Glasgow Won Ugly - But, They Won

I'LL say this for fresh-faced Glasgow Warriors coach Gregor Townsend - he has quickly bought-into the Glasgow sporting psyche - where supporting your team doesn't have to be all about the feel-good factor of cheering-on a winning side; but must involve a degree of suffering and moaning along the way to the happiness which winning brings.

 

Hardly surprising mind you; when you remember some of "Toony's" performances in the dark blue of Scotland, you realise, while the ending usually left you at least reasonably happy, it could be a bit of a roller-coaster ride. But, maybe that's how it has to be with Scotland's rugby geniuses - Andy Irvine had his days when the far side banking at Murrayfield had the demeanour of a lynch mob, with him as the target, before a single sublime moment would save his neck.

 

Thus it was with the Warriors against Zebre last night. I always felt Glasgow would prevail, but it was only when the Italians missed that late, potentially match-tying penalty, that I sensed we were safe. But, the Italians always make it hard for any Scottish side, we should accept that by now.

 

I actually think Toony showed a real coach's flair for the occasion by his team selection. Quite clearly most of Glasgow's big players were either in the stand in civvies, or on the bench, so asking so-many of the "stiffs" - not that there are too-many in the squad who are making-up the numbers, squad rotation is a vital part of success in professional rugby and every guy has to be up to the challenge - to front-up against the Pro12 whipping boys was a good move.

 

The jury is still out on much-hyped number eight Strauss, who didn't adapt well to Glasgow conditions and didn't get across the gain line as we were maybe led to expect he could. MacDonald looked, at last, like an All Black blind side, while young Sean Kennedy demonstrated that we still produce good number nines in Scotland - he didn't look out of place in the Pro12, which is a big step-up from the Premiership, his normal habitat with Stirling.

 

Yes, Glasgow again coughed-up ball under pressure in the red zone, but, they are getting in there regularly. I felt referee Leighton Hodges did them few favours; he yellow-carded two of the Italians and could have banished several more. But, and this is a typical Scottish trait when frustrations grow, once or twice he had to remind skipper Chris Fusaro that he was hearing too-many Weegie voices. Just as well Weegie Moaner-in-Chief John Barclay was in the stand rather than on the field maybe.

 

However, a win is a win, onwards and upwards.

 

 

 

WEEK Six of the RBS Premiership will see the first third of the campaign completed. Ayr will be favourites to maintain their sparkling early season form against a Heriot's side which has, so far, blown hot and cold.

 

But the chaps from Goldenacre have, like Ayr, won at Melrose this season, lifting the Bill McLaren Shield in the process, before dropping it into the grateful lap of Edinburgh Accies last weekend.

 

The Edinburgh side will wish to make amends at Millbrae, so I am looking forward to a good game.

 

Elsewhere, the game of the day is surely at Maleny Park, where Gala are the visitors. Currie have been ear-marked as the side most-likely to de-rail the Ayr express, the visit of the cup-holders will surely be a good indication of how ready they are for the role of bringing back the Ayr aces - this one will sizzle from start to finish I wager.

 

Another good game is in prospect at Raeburn Place. Accies finally posted a win last week in their Stockbridge Derby with Heriot's, whilst Dundee's results so far this season have disappointed that hard task-master Ian Rankin. This one will be just as tight and hard-fought as the one at Currie and is difficult to call.

 

Boroughmuir badly need a home win, and could get it against Stirling County, whilst Aberdeen Grammar's early season travails are unlikely to end as they entertain a Melrose side, still smarting from their home hammering from Ayr last week.

 

Craig Chalmers clearly had on his petted lip when he gave his post-match press briefing, which was a model for the bad loser coach. Chic son, losing by three tries to nil at home is a bad defeat - bad luck had nothing to do with it.

 

I expect Aberdeen to feel the back-lash from the Greenyards Gang.

Suffer The Little Children

LIKE almost every other player of my Baby Boomer generation, I learned my rugby at school, starting aged 11, when I went to secondary school. In my case (fortunately) I passed the "Qualify" and went to a Senior Secondary - Cumnock Academy.

 

In 1950s Ayrshire there were only a handful of senior secondaries - Marr College, Spiers School, Dalry High School and the Academies at Ardrossan, Ayr, Cumnock, Kilmarnock and Irvine Royal. All these schools played rugby, with Cumnock and Irvine also playing football.

 

So, for my generation, you learned your rugby at school, before passing seamlessly to the clubs. All the Ayrshire clubs, Ardrossan Academicals, Ayr, Cumnock, Dalry HSFP, Irvine, Kilmarnock, Marr College FP and Old Spierians were "open", but as a general rule the four clubs without the obvious FP suffix were largely former pupils clubs for the relevant schools.

 

Indeed, as a member of Ayr in the early 1970s, I can recall some Ayr Academicals threatening to oppose the nomination of a non Ayr Academical as captain, before wiser counsel prevailed and the nominee proved to be one of the club's finest skippers.

 

With PE teachers such as Jock McClure at Cumnock, TB Watson at Ayr and Campbell Bone at Ardrossan, you played rugby - or else. Indeed, I still find it ironic that the only Cumnock Academy pupil to openly defy "Stiffy" McClure and refuse to play "egg ball" was Jock Craig - now Director of Rugby at Ayr.

 

Anyway, you were shown the basics by a teacher who was an active club player, you progressed through the XVs and when you left school, you joined the local club, found your level and played on for as long as you wished. Indeed, one of my contemporaries turned-out in the Legends Match at the start of the season which was part of Irvine RFC's 50th anniversary celebrations, at the age of 66.

 

At school, we had a full fixture list, home and away matches against the other Ayrshire senior secondaries, plus trips to Dumfries to face Dumfries Academy and St Joseph's College, into Lanarkshire to play Hamilton Academy and Dalziel High School and into Glasgow to play the likes of Shawlands Academy, Queen's Park Secondary, Bellahouston Academy, Hyndland School, Jordanhill College School, Whitehill Secondary, we even had a fixture at first and second XV level with Keil School.

 

On a good year weather-wise, we could play some 30 matches. We also had access to the school-boys enclosure at the front at Murrayfield for the internationals, while at senior level, our better players got to play for Ayrshire and, if good enough, for Glasgow Schools.

 

Then, somewhere around the late seventies, the tide turned against school sport, the older enthusiastic teachers began to retire and their successors weren't as enthusiastic. Then came the Teachers Strike of the early 1980s, after which school football and rugby all but sank without trace.

 

Sure, in Ayrshire "Luddites" such as Brian Gilbert and John Sharkey at Marr, or Hector Crawford at Belmont Academy, fought against the rising tide of apathy, but, somewhere along the way, to be involved in schools rugby almost become a barrier to career advancement. SChools rugby withered on the vine and for all some sterling efforts at club level - Ayr being a terrific example, the club's didn't take-up the slack.

 

We now have, this season, a situation whereby there are NO state schools playing in the Brewer Dolphin Schools Cups, at the elite level. This competition has in effect become the private schools' Scottish Chamionships.

 

Nothing against private schools. As a player I simply loved rucking squealing members of Old Boys club XVs out of rucks; this was an uplifting experience for we working class thugs. However, rugby in Scotland will never prosper until it becomes classless.

 

Some clubs have excellent relations with their "feeder" schools, even to the extent of providing the rugby coaches - but, the SRU ought to be more pro-active in selling the game to today's school children, to guarantee the game's future.

 

Unless we nurture the grass roots, out top sward will wither. We could start with a really determined effort to broaden the entries to the Scottish Schools Cup. And, while I am at it, what happened to the plans to merge the Schools and Under-18s competitions into one.

 

It seems to me, the posh schools didn't fancy having to expose their little darlings to the oiks, so, it didn't happen. Shame on the SRU for not making it happen.

 

I fancy a lot of rugby-mad former PE teachers in the state sector, not least a certain W McLaren, are sitting up there in the great club house in the sky, seething into their beet at what we have allowed to happen.

Chic Chalmers - Dummies Spat To Order

NOT having my Oxford Book of Quotations to hand, I cannot re-call who came up with that line about never being able to mix-up a Scot with a grievance and a ray of sunshine; it might well have been that old English fart Dr Johnson, but, who really cares.

 

These days in rugby, Craig Chalmers comes across as a definitive Scot with a grievance, his being a double one - that he's not coaching Scotland and that his Melrose side are not walking away with the RBS Premiership title.

 

There were no Cheeky Chic quotes in Sunday's as usual pitifully sparse coverage of the Premiership; not that, Ayr having beaten 'Rose at the Greenyards, it was ever likely that Chic would have rushed to offer his post-match thoughts. However, when Willie Paul was unable to elicit the great man's thoughts for Monday's Scotsman report, I sensed a spat dummy lying in front of the home dug out.

 

But, all was not lost, whoever did the Herald's Premiership round-up for Monday - and (again) I offer the thought that, maybe if the Herald paid more than lip service to the top tier of our club game, its circulation would not be going through the floor - did manage to get a quote from Chalmers. Even by his poor standards of reaction to defeat, it was a belter.

 

Class, they say, is permanent. Chic was a classy player, sadly he seems to have left that aspect of himself behind when he retired. His reaction was totally graceless and petty.

 

Mind you, Ayr's rebound from last season's under-performance has been spectacular. OK, you never win any title in September, but, a poor start to the season can fatally wound title aspirations.

Kenny Murray's men have now beaten all four of this season's Scottish representatives in the British & Irish Cup, two of these victories came at Netherdale and the Greenyards, two of the genuine fortresses of the club game. So, Ayr's title aspirations have, event his early in the campaign, to be taken seriously.

Admittedly, they gained in spades from Glasgow Hawks' disappointing campaign in 2011-12, the Gossmans, Peter Jerecevich and the injured Dean Kelbrick have proven to be excellent recruits. Ayr entertain Heriot's on Saturday and if they can beat the Goldenacre men, then there will be a lot of pressure on Currie to peg them back, since they are now being seen as the side most-likely to impede Ayr's progress.

However, behind Ayr's storming start, the new Top Ten is proving to be an engrossing and entertaining competition, which has to be good for Scottish rugby.



THE Herald this week ran an interesting piece on how we are bringing through our young props. Certainly a few of our top teams have been busy recruiting southern hemisphere "donkeys", when perhaps they should be putting more emphasis on grooming our own big boys for the vital roles in shirts one and three. It seems a long time since the likes of Sandy Carmichael and Iain Milne were being blooded in the national side at what is today seen as a callow age.

Props notoriously take longer to mature, but there are some good and highly-promising young bloods learning the grunt and bash game in the Premiership. Young George Hunter is showing well, generally off the bench, with Ayr, whilst also gaining valuable game time, again off the bench, for Warriors. However, we need a few more to be pushing in more ways than one.



WE ALL like to bitch and moan about how out-of-touch the Murrayfield "blazers" sometimes appear to be. I sometimes think they actually enjoy being thus seen, particularly when they pull a master stroke, such as getting All Blacks coaching guru Wayne Smith to come over and impart his wisdom to some of our home-grown coaches, as he will next month.

Chapeau tipped in the direction of EH12.



I SEE Sir Clive Woodward might find himself out of a job as the success of London 2012 fades and the long haul to Rio 2016 starts.

Please, please, please, will whoever is charged with putting together the Rugby Sevens programme for Rio immediately put out of their heads, any thoughts of, because of his track record as a World Cup winner with England and his subsequent role within Team GB up to and throughout London 2012, Sir Clive being the man to run Team GB's Rugby Sevens programme.

Maybe as a technical director, along the lines of cycling's Dave Brailsford, he could set-up the programme - but, he doesn't for my money have the necessary feel for sevens and honestly, sticking the ball up the pack's jumper and rumbling forward for the by then nearly 40-years-old Jonny Wilkinson to kick dropped goals, will not bring gold in Rio.