Replacements on tour for Jerry Flannery and Leigh Halfpenny will be announced later today – watch this space! Jim Telfer has tipped Ross Ford as the ideal man for the job, while former Lions hooker Keith Wood has gone for Rory Best. Meanwhile Chris Paterson’s name has appeared out of nowhere since Halfpenny was pulled [...]

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Or three, perhaps. More players have joined Tomas O’Leary and Tom Shanklin on the list of Lions casualties, and the tour has not even started. Alan Quinlan’s ban for gouging was upheld, so he will not tour to South Africa. Non-surprise of the year is that Tom Croft will replace him, offering something different in [...]

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Cardiff 14 – 36 Edinburgh Edinburgh put together a solid performance in defence coupled with some excellent counter-attacking rugby to snatch a record second place finish in the Magners League with an away victory in the last match to be played at Cardiff Arms Park. A few decisions from Irish ref Simon McDowell that were [...]

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In form Northampton Saints centre Joe Ansbro has been called up to the Scotland A Team squad to play in the IRB Nations Cup. Ansbro, born in Glasgow, but eligible to play for England too, will be representing the fair nation of Scotland for the first time. And you never know, with Max Evans out [...]

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I’ve been kind of excited all morning, so I shudder to think the pain the players have been going through waiting for this announcement. Backs Lee Byrne, Rob Kearney, Shane Williams, Leigh Halfpenny, Ugo Monye, Luke Fitzgerald, Tommy Bowe, Tom Shanklin, Jamie Roberts, Brian O’ Driscoll, Keith Earls, Rikki Flutey, Ronan O’ Gara, Stephen Jones, [...]

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So if you were planning to apply for the job of Scotland coach, you are now too late. We should get a result in the next four weeks or so. They claim to have received applications from around the world, although Andy Robinson is still the front runner. The deadline has also passed to squeeze [...]

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This would be the team I announce tomorrow, and here’s why: 15 – Chris Paterson. This was trickier than I thought, which is a good thing. Hugo has been on fire recently, but before the recent rib injury, so was Mossy. Frank Hadden is looking for maturity of decision making from this team, having identified [...]

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1) With the mid level teams (Fiji, Samoa, Italy, Georgia) fronting up at World Cup time as the professional game grows, does it really matter who we have in our group in NZ 2011? Sure we could get a couple of stinkers, but with a young team that should be together for the next three [...]

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