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Four takeaways from Townsend's Scotland team to tackle Italy
By Bryn Palmer
Gregor Townsend’s Scotland team for their opening game of the Six Nations Championship against Italy was broadly along expected lines – with the notable exception of the selection of Dave Cherry to start at hooker.
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The return of experienced lock Jonny Gray for the first time in nearly two years bolsters a pack missing the redoubtable Scott Cummings, while Stafford McDowall deservedly got the nod to replace injured club-mate Sione Tuipulotu at centre.
Here are four takeaways after Townsend sat down with the media to discuss his choices in more depth – and Scotland’s prospects for the tournament.
Stafford’s not just a stand-in for Sione…he has his own strengths
Scotland fans have had 10 days now to digest the unpalatable news that their captain and talisman Sione Tuipulotu will play no part in this year’s Six Nations.
If a sense of despondency was understandable given the sensational form the Glasgow centre was in, the feeling of loss may be diluted somewhat if Stafford McDowall can reproduce the form he showed on his first start in the Championship last March.
Despite a 17-13 defeat against Ireland in Dublin, McDowall was a big part of Scotland’s most complete performance of the campaign, highlighting the giant strides he has taken over the past few seasons to become one of Warriors’ leading performers.
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Like Tuipulotu, the 26-year-old brings a triple threat in attack – with a strong running and passing game, allied to a cultured left boot – and a big presence on defence.
“Stafford, of any player I believe I’ve worked with over the last few years, is the most deserving of getting this opportunity,” Townsend said. “The adversity he’s had to go through, the hard work he puts in continually, I’m sure he’s going to go and grab his opportunity, like he did in Ireland.
“It’s probably the toughest game you can play now (in Dublin), maybe along with Paris, in the Six Nations, and he played very well that day, so he can start this game with a lot of confidence.
“He’s got cohesion there, having played with Huw (Jones) on a number of occasions. Whenever he’s been given the opportunity, whether on the summer tour or November Tests, he’s really stepped up. He’s a very good player, Stafford, he’ll bring his own strengths to the game.”
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Welcome back to the Six Nations Darcy Graham – the modern-day ‘Robbo’?
The Six Nations has been cruelly denied the presence of Darcy Graham in full flight since March 2022, injury having kept the Edinburgh wing out of the last two Scotland campaigns.
Graham has scored seven tries in his 13 outings in the Championship, part of a tally of 29 in 42 Tests that has put him second on Scotland’s all-time list, one behind club-mate Duhan van der Merwe.
But since returning to fitness this season, Townsend believes the 27-year-old Borderer has developed new strings to his bow, as well as retaining his predatory eye for a gap in opposition defences.
“He wasn’t very happy with his performances in November – we were, and I’m sure the public were – but he knows there’s more in him and he’s improved physically a lot. I think you see him getting on the ball more and more.
“He rides those big tackles and then he’s good to go again and his link play is something that’s really impressed us. He’s now giving as many try assists as he is scoring tries and we just want to see him get on the ball as much as possible.
“He is developing that wider game, that ball-playing ability, his aerial skills too. It’s something he feels not only he can improve but it can really be another weapon for him, with the attacking kicks that you can get through more. He’s getting up to win those balls either cleanly or knocking them back.
“Darcy brings so much, he excites the crowd but also inspires his team-mates. His work in contact, his bravery, it has an influence, it’s infectious.
“I’m trying to think of a player that has that ability to stop, start, bounce out after getting knocked backwards and then make a break. Someone like Jason Robinson springs to mind – that ability, the same physical dimensions. He was so hard to defend and I’m sure Darcy is a nightmare for the opposition.”
Come in Gregor Brown… your time is (almost) now
If Grant Gilchrist and Jonny Gray – once they had proved their fitness after recent knocks, and given the absence of the injured Scott Cummings – appear logical choices to resume a second-row partnership that started 16 times together between 2018 and 2022, it wasn’t quite as straightforward as most would assume.
The old warhorses have 152 caps between them and a prodigious work-rate and set-piece expertise that have served Scotland well down the years, but Gregor Brown – who starts on the bench – “was competing very hard to start in the second row”, Townsend said.
Glasgow head coach Franco Smith likes to call Brown, 23, one of his ‘flocks’ – a hybrid forward who can play flanker or lock – and his rapid progress saw him win his first Test caps last summer – two starts at six, one at four – and another off the bench in November against Fiji before injury intervened.
“Gregor was very close to being on the bench against South Africa when we were looking at a 6-2 split,” Townsend explained. “Unfortunately, he was injured and wasn’t able to play that game. Since then, it’s not the bench option we’re looking at, we’re looking at him pushing for a starting place.
“On the summer tour, (forwards coach) John Dalziel kept giving me feedback on how natural a line-out forward he is, how easy he is to lift, how quickly he gets off the ground. We were also seeing in his game real skill at ball carrying, passing, a nuisance and aggressive in defence. To put them together, as he has done throughout December and into January, is really good.”
At 6ft 3in (1.91m) and 109kg (17st 2lb), Brown is not a giant by modern second-row standards, but Townsend believes his technical prowess makes up for any perceived shortfall in physique.
“It’s what they do technically to make sure that they are delivering in the set-piece, in the maul and in the scrum in particular,” he added. “And scrum-wise, he’s very, very good. (Scotland scrum coach) Pieter de Villiers talks him up as our best technical scrummager. He looks like a bigger second row than probably his weight is.”
Can home comforts help Scotland launch a title challenge?
Scotland have won their opening game in the Six Nations for each of the last four years, including two at Twickenham and last year in Cardiff. But in Townsend’s seven previous campaigns, they have only started at home twice.
Three years ago they beat England 20-17 – the second of four successive Calcutta Cup wins – and the other occasion was in 2019, when Italy were the visitors to Murrayfield.
Blair Kinghorn scored a hat-trick of tries that day – he managed the same feat against the Azzurri at the end of the 2023 Championship – but Ireland, like this year, were in Edinburgh a week later and a 22-13 defeat swiftly doused Scottish optimism.
If they can get the job done against Italy on Saturday, Ireland’s visit on 9 February again shapes as the pivotal game of Scotland’s campaign. But given he has yet to crack the Irish question in 10 attempts, Townsend was understandably reticent when asked about a schedule of two home games to kick off. “I’ll tell you in a couple of weeks,” he grinned.
Nevertheless, with a third home game against Wales to come in round four, the head coach acknowledged the “massive positive” of preparing and playing in familiar surroundings, as well as the “energy” the players will feed off over the next fortnight.
“But you’ve got to win away from home in this tournament as well, and the focus over the last couple of years has really narrowed on producing our best performances to start tournaments. We just have to do that this year at home.”
Despite the loss of Tuipulotu and Cummings, Townsend believes there is nothing to be gained from dousing the expectation and optimism those supporters will bring to Murrayfield, or that emanating from his players.
“This is a more experienced team in terms of caps (707 in the starting XV) than we played in our last game, which was a very good win against Australia, so this team should be able to build on what we did in November,” he added.
“As a coach, you are trying to create an undercurrent of optimism. You’ve got to sell your attacking game plan, your defensive game plan to the players and say, ‘this is going to bring us success’. Optimism is always something we would want in a group.
“I think the distraction of thinking of the end goal before putting in the work, that’s what you don’t want. That might have come in a few times over the last few years when we get past a couple of games and we haven’t been totally focused for those 80 minutes.
“That’s going to be something to keep an eye on this tournament. It’s something we’ve talked about with the players. But for this first game, so much work goes in just to make sure we’ve got that clarity and cohesion, the players won’t be thinking past Saturday.”
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Italy win by 3