UK Edition
Gregor Townsend exclusive interview: 'Scotland can beat any team in the world'
The Galashiels Academy schoolboy was as captivated as any in the 60,000 crowd crammed into Murrayfield in 1990 – the day of that slow, David Sole walk to the middle, the spine-tingling prelude to Scotland’s shock Grand Slam win over England.
The noise, the clamour, the empathy, the sheer tribal ferocity made an impact on Gregor Townsend, the sort of rousing backdrop that he believes finally came back again in November when the Scotland team he now coaches caused euphoria among their rugby followers with their eight-try rip-roaring, run-at-all-costs 53-24 win over Australia.
If affirmation were needed that Townsend’s Scotland had substance to go with their style, clinical potency to round off enterprising build-up, it came in that match.
“I played for Scotland for 10 years [1993-2003] and I couldn’t remember an atmosphere like it,” said Townsend. “It was just like when I was watching from the terracing back in 1990. The players are getting a huge amount from it, the energy, the optimism…”
And the hope? Ah, yes, the hope. It is the hope that kills you, of course, as Scottish fans know only too well. Townsend does not duck that aspect, having experienced the false buoyancy of a decent autumn campaign during his own playing days only for the championship to fall flat. But better to be with it than without it, to have dreams and ambitions.
“There is no be no turning back [in terms of approach],” said Townsend. “It is the best way for us to try to win. It may not be so for every team. We play to what we believe are our strengths, many of which are traditional elements of the Scottish game – speed, dynamism, producing quick ball. And work-rate. Nothing can happen unless the work-rate is high.”
Townsend is no naif. He endured plenty of lows in his career, rebuked at times for daring to try things, cursed with the dreaded “maverick” label, and is fully aware that playing quick, top-of-the-ground rugby can be negated by big beasts of burden in opposition. It so happened at Twickenham in March that those monsters were dressed in white and dumped on the feel-good vibe within Scottish rugby following wins over Ireland and Wales. The 61-21 defeat by England was salutary.
Townsend was not in charge then, taking over from Vern Cotter only in time for the summer tour to Australia and Fiji. Even so, the Scotland head coach acknowledges the realities of the situation yet makes no attempt to put a brake on the sense of anticipation north of the border.
“I am a big believer in setting high expectations,” said Townsend. “It shows the players that you believe they can achieve, that it is right for them to aspire. If we can get things right, we can beat any team in the world.
“We showed that when coming so close against New Zealand [losing 17-22] but one of our failings that day, our finishing, was corrected against the Wallabies the following week. But, yes, our players are very aware of the fact that if they don’t get it right then days like they had at Twickenham can happen.
“Wins are great for confidence but losses aid learning. You have to use everything at your disposal. We have to be mindful that teams will want to slow us down, that the rugby in the Six Nations is often different to the rugby played in November. But the message to the players is to believe, to believe in what they have done and what it takes to get there.”
Only a few days after that Australia victory, Townsend was pictured alongside Pep Guardiola after spending a day observing the Manchester City manager at work, something he had previously done when visiting the Spaniard at Barcelona. Eddie Jones has had many such outings. As with so many coaches, Townsend is a magpie spirit, taking bits of information from all sorts of sources, ever restless, ever eager for new data.
He noted previously, for example, that one of the most impressive things about Guardiola’s teams was not their devastating powers of attack but rather the manner in which they got the ball back, transitioning from defence, Townsend observing that Barcelona managed to reduce that switch from an average span of seven seconds to three seconds.
The same principle holds true in rugby – and for this Scottish team in particular – on the counter-attack.
Townsend has always had a panoramic view of things, on life as much as in sport, an eagerness to explore that accounts for his nomadic playing career, with two stints in Australia, several stop-offs in France, a shift in England (Northampton) and also in South Africa with the Sharks. He is well travelled, in mind as much as in body. He is a student of American sport, placing faith in many of the principles espoused in Dean Smith’s The Carolina Way, in which the Tar Heels’ basketball guru at the University of Carolina speaks of the merits of dignity and respect and player-led set-ups as prerequisites to success.
Certainly, Townsend connects vividly to the job in hand, be it insisting on removing the glass frontage to the coaches’ box at Murrayfield so better to experience the atmosphere, or in the sheer relish he expresses for empowering his players to go out and perform.
“We want to put our game out there,” said Townsend, who will have been buoyed by the brilliant return from injury at the weekend of full-back Stuart Hogg.
There is much to go into the mix for Scotland ahead of this year’s Six Nations. They are battling with a front-row injury crisis and know that they have to beef up their resources. But even on a bracing Edinburgh afternoon, with the snow sweeping eastwards, there was to be no dampening of spirits in the Scotland camp. There was bounce, enthusiasm and positivity.
There may well be some setbacks and lulls along the way but under Townsend, one thing is for sure – there will always be a sense of possibility.