John Barclay will start as Scotland captain for the first time in a long and winding career. There have been “downs”, but to captain his country against the country where he lives and works will be a considerable “up”.
He is joined in the back row by John Hardie who surprisingly replaces Hamish Watson, and Ryan Wilson – who started the game against Ireland – replaces the injured Josh Strauss.
Gordon Reid gets the nod at loosehead as Allan Dell swaps to the bench but the front five is otherwise unchanged.
In the backs, Ali Price gets the nod at scrum half while Tim Visser comes in for Sean Maitland who picked up a knock for Saracens (as a replacement for Duncan Taylor) and will be tasked with marking George North…
There are two decent teams here. My worry is that we haven’t seen much of the new high tackle directives yet so we are due a bit of controversy. And just look at the ref…
Scotland team to face Wales on Saturday (1425 GMT live on BBC):
15. Stuart Hogg, 14. Tommy Seymour, 13. Huw Jones, 12. Alex Dunbar, 11. Tim Visser, 10. Finn Russell, 9. Ali Price; 1. Gordon Reid, 2. Fraser Brown, 3. Zander Fagerson, 4. Richie Gray, 5. Jonny Gray, 6. John Barclay (capt), 7. John Hardie, 8. Ryan Wilson.
Replacements: 16. Ross Ford, 17. Allan Dell, 18. Simon Berghan, 19. Tim Swinson, 20. Hamish Watson, 21. Henry Pyrgos, 22. Duncan Weir, 23 Mark Bennett.
Wales: Leigh Halfpenny (Toulon); George North (Northampton), Jonathan Davies (Scarlets), Scott Williams (Scarlets), Liam Williams (Scarlets); Dan Biggar (Ospreys), Rhys Webb (Ospreys); Rob Evans (Scarlets), Ken Owens (Scarlets), Tomas Francis (Exeter Chiefs), Jake Ball (Scarlets), Alun Wyn Jones (Ospreys, capt), Sam Warburton (Cardiff Blues), Justin Tipuric (Ospreys), Ross Moriarty (Gloucester).
Replacements: Scott Baldwin (Ospreys), Nicky Smith (Ospreys), Samson Lee (Scarlets), Luke Charteris (Bath), Taulupe Faletau (Bath), Gareth Davies (Scarlets), Sam Davies (Ospreys), Jamie Roberts (Harlequins).
Referee: John Lacey (IRFU)