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'I think half the time he doesn't know what he is doing...'

(Photo by Paul Devlin/SNS Group via Getty Images)

Finn Russell has received a glowing endorsement from Stuart Hogg, his Scotland skipper, ahead of this Saturday’s Guinness Six Nations opener versus England at Murrayfield. The maverick out-half comes into the match most certainly in the English crosshairs after visiting defence coach Anthony Seibold spoke on Friday about the need to shut the Scottish playmaker down.

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“A super talented player” was how the Australian newcomer to Six Nations coaching described Russell. “If you watch his club form in Paris (with Racing) he is playing outstanding and he brings that to the Scotland team. You’re talking about how do you take away his weapons? Well, obviously time and space.    

Finn Russell wants time and space where he can ball play. He has a very effective kicking game, both short and long, so you need to take time and space away from Finn. That is easier said than done of course. 

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“Making sure that we go after Finn Russell, not in an outside our defence system way but we want to make sure we put pressure on Finn Russell and you need to win the collisions, you need to win the ruck and the ruck speed to be able to do that.”

The threat that Russell will pose England was a subject that Scotland skipper Stuart Hogg took up later on Friday when he held his eve-of-match media briefing. “Finn Russell is up there with the best tens in the world because he understands the game incredibly well and I think half the time he doesn’t know what he is doing, so if he doesn’t know that he is doing then everybody else has not got a bloody clue. 

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“But he is quality, he is absolute quality. He cares deeply about this squad, he cares about getting the best out of himself. When he is firing and has got a forward pack going forward that he is one of the best tens in world rugby. To try and defend him, I’m sure England will have a strategy to try and keep him quiet.

“But I am sure he will find ways in and around that to have a big impact on the game and for me to have the opportunity to play outside Finn is absolutely incredible and hopefully tomorrow he is on song.”

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fl 2 hours ago
‘The problem with this year’s Champions Cup? Too many English clubs’

"Right, so even if they were the 4 worst teams in Champions Cup, you'd still have them back by default?"

I think (i) this would literally never happen, (ii) it technically couldn't quite happen, given at least 1 team would qualify via the challenge cup, so if the actual worst team in the CC qualified it would have to be because they did really well after being knocked down to the challenge cup.

But the 13th-15th teams could qualify and to be fair I didn't think about this as a possibility. I don't think a team should be able to qualify via the Champions Cup if they finish last in their group.


Overall though I like my idea best because my thinking is, each league should get a few qualification spots, and then the rest of the spots should go to the next best teams who have proven an ability to be competitive in the champions cup. The elite French clubs generally make up the bulk of the semi-final spots, but that doesn't (necessarily) mean that the 5th-8th best French clubs would be competitive in a slimmed down champions cup. The CC is always going to be really great competition from the semis onwards, but the issue is that there are some pretty poor showings in the earlier rounds. Reducing the number of teams would help a little bit, but we could improve things further by (i) ensuring that the on-paper "worst" teams in the competition have a track record of performing well in the CC, and (ii) by incentivising teams to prioritise the competition. Teams that have a chance to win the whole thing will always be incentivised to do that, but my system would incentivise teams with no chance of making the final to at least try to win a few group stage matches.


"I'm afraid to say"

Its christmas time; there's no need to be afraid!

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