Moody Blue takes in the return of Rory Lamont and a high scoring affair between Currie and Dundee.
Glasgow announced earlier in the week that Sean Lamont is to join his brother Rory at the Warriors from next season, following a successful spell at Welsh region the Scarlets where he has played not only wing, but also centre and fullback. Indeed this year’s Six Nations went on to see Sean collect unexpected international honours in the centre, filling in for Graeme Morrison during the Six Nations where he proved an effective battering ram.
Glasgow today announced their team to face bogey team the Dragons on Sunday but such exciting news as Johnnie Beattie or Ruaridh Jackson’s return to play following injury and Rob Dewey being made the captain has been over-shadowed by the news that they have secured the services of free-agent and pioneer of the Rory Lamont Helicopter move, none other than Rory Lamont himself.
As of Friday Scotland utility back Rory Lamont was released from his French club Toulon by mutual consent. He was citing lack of game time whilst his employers claimed he had distanced himself from the rest of the squad and was just not interacting.
It appears that Lamont enjoyed himself very little while he was in France. When the news broke of his release he said on Twitter: “I want to play for Scotland and I have to find a club where I can play more rugby – and I promise it will not be in France!
Let me set the scene for you: Scotland play 2 EMC Tests with 6 back-three options. They play one game against Ireland with S. Lamont, Paterson and Walker. Then they play against Italy with R. Lamont, Evans and Danielli. Then they take out Walker and send the rest off to New Zealand.
My question for you is: What should Scotland’s back-three be?
Uh-huh. Mmmm. Ok. Right. I see.
Well forget all that, I’m now going to ask a few ex-internationals instead because –no offence!- I’m pretty sure we would all love to hear what Scotland and Lions greats Ken Scotland and Andy Irvine have to say instead!
According to STV news Joe Ansbro, Hugo Southwell and Rory Lamont will all sit out this weekend’s game with Ireland due to injury. Unlike the England Internationals, our exiles were back in action this weekend and Joe picked up a head knock after a collision with Butch James, he has been rested from training as a routine precaution and is unlikely to feature.
Two of Scotland’s long lost wounded full backs, Rory Lamont and Chris Paterson, are returning to Scotland duty for Andy Robinson’s summer training camp in St Andrews. They come back into a Scotland side finally finding its winning hat and find their favourite shirt (well, Rory’s at any rate) filled by a vastly improved incumbent (Hugo Southwell) and a young tyro pushing for honours (Jim Thompson).
So near and yet not actually that far. Shane Williams had a great five minutes. Dan Parks had a great game. George Clancy: not so much.
5.7 (e) If time expires and the ball is not dead, or an awarded scrum or lineout has not been completed the referee allows play to continue until the next time that the ball becomes dead. If time expires and a mark, free kick or penalty kick is then awarded the referee allows play to continue.
Still, all of that is of little consequence in the great scheme of things. Full reaction will of course take place through the week, but for now all of us at Scottish Rugby Blog send our best wishes to Thom Evans for a swift and complete recovery from his injury (the exact nature of which is unclear), and our thoughts go out to Max and the rest of the family too.
UPDATE: just in case you wanted to see the full interview with Andy Robinson post match you can find it here. Much angrier than the short version they broadcast!
UPDATE: Update on Thom Evans injury condition, it seems he has undergone neck surgery but is able to move his arms and legs which is good news I should think.
UPDATE: Another update on Thom Evans, Chris Paterson and Rory Lamont injuries (from Dr James Robson), all of which it seems will keep them out of the remainder of the Six Nations but thankfully all will have full recoveries, it is hoped.
Alisdair Strokosch will miss the Six Nations opener against France on Sunday having failed to recover in time from an ankle injury. His place in the team will probably be taken by in-form Kelly Brown given Jason White is also currently injured. This might affect the bench though, as Brown is pretty versatile whereas the likes of Gray or Rennie who are probably in line along with Macdonald are less so. Rory Lamont is still with the squad but will not be considered for selection as he too is recovering from an ankle injury.
A full Scotland team announcement will be at tomorrow around noon and I hope to have it for you as soon as possible after that!
Congrats to Edinburgh who scraped a win at Ulster over the weekend. Things are looking good if they can still nick an away victory even whilst under the kosh and in front of a partisan crowd. Mossy seems to have kicked well and Mark Robertson continues to look sharp. Good also to see a World Class drop goal from Phil, I hope he’s been practicing as it is one thing (among many) we could use for Scotland. As long as he doesn’t start trying from inside his own half ala Hernandez or Franc Steyn.
Glasgow were beaten by their bogey team the Dragons, while in other more surprising news perennial underachievers Connacht beat Cardiff who now find themselves draped over the bottom of the league table.
Catch the highlights show here (UK only).
Meanwhile in the absence of someone stepping forward to fill the role of Top 14 correspondent, I did a bit of digging on Eurosport site and managed to find that Rory Lamont played at the weekend (at fullback) for Toulon in their defeat of Toulose. Jonny is back to his best, according to Al’s nemesis Freddie Michalak. Speaking of Al, happy birthday for tomorrow big man! While digging I couldn’t see any sign of Hugo at Stade but that is less than surprising given the depth of their squad and recent coaching turnaround. Haskell seems to have been in Stade’s back row while Simon Taylor was MIA (as was Big Jason for Clermont), and Andy Henderson stayed on the bench for Montauban.
I was hoping to catch the Leinster game this week as I will be down in the big smoke and wanted to see if Edinburgh can make it four in a row and stay atop the table, but alas stupid Setanta scheduling has the kickoff at 630pm which clashes with an important social engagement. Whatever happened to 3pm on a Saturday?
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