Allan Massie: Scottish pro sides are always up against it when facing Euro elite


EDINBURGH and Glasgow have both made indifferent starts to the Magners League, Edinburgh indeed a sadly disappointing one.
This puts more pressure on both clubs in the Heineken Cup which starts this weekend. There would be pressure in any case, for it is by performances in the Heineken that Scottish, Welsh and Irish clubs are really judged. Leinster, for instance, may haADVERTISEMENT ve won the Magners last season, but that achievement was dwarfed by Munster's Heineken triumph. Now, though neither of the Scottish clubs need yet abandon hope of finishing near the top of the Magners, their poor start means that the Heineken takes on added significance.

When the draw was made, Edinburgh had reason for optimism. Leinster, Wasps, Castres: none is a pushover, but all are beatable. If Edinburgh's form had been better, their rivals would seem even more beatable now, for Wasps and Castres have both made even worse starts to the season than Edinburgh, while Leinster have lost their last two matches – against Munster (at home) and, with an understrength side, Connacht (away). On the other hand they thrashed Edinburgh 52-6 in Dublin last month, Edinburgh's worst result, and probably performance, in years.

Injuries have contributed to Edinburgh's disappointing results – even though before the season started there was confident talk of the strength in depth they now have. Nevertheless the absentees have been significant. Edinburgh's three best players last season were Mike Blair, Ben Cairns and Ross Rennie. Cairns and Rennie have been off all season, and have been badly missed – Cairns as Edinburgh's most creative back and Rennie as a genuine No7 and ball-winner.

Allan MacDonald when fit has been a fair replacement for Rennie, but, though Hugo Southwell, drafted to the centre in Cairns's absence, has many merits, he lacks Cairns's imagination, quick hands and eye for the right line to run.

One of the features of Edinburgh's game last year was the neat interplay between Cairns and Nick de Luca which frequently opened up defences. That has been missing, and Edinburgh haven't scored a try in their past two games.

When a team is out of form it is usually out of luck too. In Belfast last week – a match from which Mike Blair was rested and Chris Paterson was missing after unwisely tangling with Big Jim Hamilton in training – Ulster were awarded the only try of the match, even though in a kick-and-chase the ball clearly crossed the touchline.

Today, with Blair, Paterson and MacDonald back, and the dashing Simon Webster available for his first game this season, would be a good occasion for form to return and luck to change.

Leinster don't have a great record at Murrayfield, which is encouraging. On the other hand, by signing the Springbok prop CJ van der Linde, and the Wallaby flanker, Ricky Elsom, they are stronger where they were weak last year.

All the same a victory would give Edinburgh's season just the fillip it needs. They must surely win their home matches and at least one away game to have a chance of qualifying for the knockout stages. Glasgow have on the face of it a harder pool than Edinburgh: Toulouse, Bath and the Dragons.

Dragons may be the weakest of the Welsh clubs, and Glasgow may look for home and away wins against them. But Toulouse and Bath are both formidable and both have struck form this year. Still, Glasgow may take comfort from the thought that Edinburgh came very close to beating Toulouse at Murrayfield in last year's Heineken, and from the knowledge that they are themselves a hard side to beat at Hughenden.

Any optimism should, however, be tempered by realism. The odds are stacked against the two Scottish teams simply because they are the poor relations in the Heineken.

Watching a French top-14 match last week, one learned that Toulon have a budget of 13million – almost £10million. That is considerably more than the combined budgets of Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Admittedly, money isn't everything – Toulon are struggling in the Top 14 and were hammered 3-56 at home by Northampton in the Challenge Cup on Thursday (even though they may have fielded a second string side for the match).

All the same, money matters. The SRU can't afford to bring in star players from the Southern Hemisphere, in the way that so many French, English and now Irish clubs can. So Edinburgh and Glasgow are almost always at a disadvantage. It's foolish to pretend otherwise.

The fact is that our two pro teams, like our national side itself, have usually to play above themselves even to hold their own. As with Scotland, the surprise is not that they lose a number of matches, but that they win as many as they do.

This will remain the case until professional rugby in Scotland is on a much sounder financial footing than it is now – and there is very little prospect of this happening in the near future. Given the world credit crunch and the impending economic recession, one might even say there is no such prospect.

IN NUMBERS

9,000,000
The Heineken Cup will welcome its nine millionth fan in the later pool rounds.

1,000
Heineken Cup record points-scorer Ronan O'Gara needs 46 more to reach four figures. He has scored in his last 58 appearances and failed in just three of his 75 Heineken Cup games. Former Glasgow fly-half Tommy Hayes is Scotland's top-scorer with 388 points.

100
Toulouse will become first club to reach a century of Heineken Cup games when they face Bath in January – Munster will hit 100 if they reach the quarter-finals.

86
Most appearances in the Heineken Cup, held by Munster back row Anthony Foley, now coaching with the province.

55
Scott Murray's Montauban last night became the 55th team to play in the tournament, when they opened the 2008-9 competition away to Munster.

8
Scottish record for most penalties in one Heineken Cup match, set by Gary Parker when the Borders beat Llanelli in 1996/97 – Diego Dominguez and Thierry Lacroix have overall record with nine.

3
Scottish referees involved in this season's tournament – Peter Allan, Andy MacPherson and Neil Paterson

2
Heineken Cup finals staged at Murrayfield when curtain falls on this tournament in Edinburgh next May.

This article was posted on 11-Oct-2008, 07:31 by Hugh Barrow.