THE SCOTSMAN PREDICTS



Published Date: 11 February 2009
By David Ferguson
SCOTLAND'S national coaches have responded to the lacklustre nature of Sunday's demoralising defeat to Wales by thrusting Glasgow's Evans brothers, Max and Thom, into the side to face France in Paris on Saturday.
Graham Steadman, the Scotland defence coach, tried to give little away yesterday, first stating he did not believe team selection had caused the defeat, then hinting that changes had been made due to poor form and injury.

Finding a spark was crucial and The Scotsman understands line-breakers Thom and Max Evans will be given their first international start together when Frank Hadden announces the team today.

Steadman reiterated that Thom Evans' defence was a work in progress, but his attacking threat is clearly now more important to the coaches. He said: "Max came off the bench and made a massive impact; Thom is very much the same. We may have left out one of our important players and it may have cost us – the truth will come in the next few weeks if Thom gets his opportunity. We may be proven wrong, but hindsight is a wonderful thing and unfortunately for us the decisions we made didn't come up at the weekend."

Steadman admitted: "It was an unacceptable performance (against Wales]. I felt the scoreline was a bit flattering on our favour, if I'm being brutally honest. I don't think it was down to the selection – I think it was down to a number of different aspects – but once selection has been finalised tomorrow, there are going to be one or two disappointed players on the back of a poor performance."

As Scotland faced the possibility they could be without lock Nathan Hines for the rest of the RBS Six Nations, the injury toll lessened yesterday as all but four players returned to full training, including Thom Evans, who had been laid low over the weekend by a gastro-enteritis bug that, ironically, would have kept the Glasgow flier out of Sunday's game had he been selected.

The four still unable to train were Hines, who underwent an exploratory operation yesterday in an effort to determine the cause of persistent pain in his knee; Euan Murray, who is back with his club Northampton hoping to be fit for Scotland's match with Italy at the end of the month; and Geoff Cross and Simon Webster, who both suffered concussion in Sunday's game.

Dr James Robson, the SRU's head of medical services, revealed yesterday that Hines faces a two-to-five-week recovery from yesterday's op at best, longer if anything serious is discovered. Scotland's final game, against England, is on 21 March, just under six weeks away.

He said: "The good news is that Geoff and Simon recovered quickly from their head knocks at the weekend. The IRB conditions say we can rule them out for three weeks and then return them, or return them within that time if they satisfy certain conditions.

"I also have my own conditions which is that they recover quickly, that for the next 24 hours they should be symptom-free and have undisturbed sleep, and then that they have non-contact exercise and not provoke symptoms afterwards, and I have to report that neither of them have satisfied those conditions today.

"So, we're 24 hours behind and the medics will get the blame for the team announcement delay, but both of them will be subject to further testing. Geoff has also strained both of his knees as well.

"Euan (Murray] continues to make slow and steady progress, under the care of the Northampton medical staff, and I hope that he will be fit for the Italian match (28 February], while Nathan has failed to recover. As we speak Nathan is probably just coming out of surgery so I can't tell you the results yet, but if it has gone well it could be anything between two and five weeks."

Much interest now surrounds who comes in with Glasgow quintet Moray Low, Kelly Brown, Alastair Kellock and the Evans all having pushed for starting places, alongside Chris Paterson and Alasdair Dickinson.

Steadman added: "I've been very impressed with the honesty of the players in our reviews. No one has hidden under the table. The most impressive thing now is that they step forward and out in a performance that merits a Scotland shirt at the weekend.

"I'm ever the optimist. I told the players in a meeting yesterday that they've not to dwell on it and that they have to move forward. At this level of rugby, and with just a six-day turnaround to our next game, they're not in a position to sulk. The players that do that don't want to be part of this set-up.

"All the signs are there for us to move forward. The players know this, and know they have to be accountable. The best way to answer the media and supporters is to put up a performance on Saturday."

This article was posted on 11-Feb-2009, 08:39 by Hugh Barrow.