Stuart Hogg retirement: Incredible impact on Scotland, harsh criticism, hint at what's next in future for all-time great

Eleven years is a long time in sport, so it is easy to forget just how big an impact Stuart Hogg made when he burst onto the scene as a 15th-minute replacement for Max Evans against Wales in the second game of Scotland’s 2012 Six Nations campaign.

Stuart Hogg with daughter Olivia May Hogg and sons Archie William and George during a Guinness Six Nations match between Scotland and Ireland at BT Murrayfield, on March 12, 2023, which turned out to be his last match for his country.

Every time the fresh-face 19-year-old touched the ball, a bolt of electricity pulsated through the Millennium Stadium (as it was then known). One fearless charge on the left wing led to Greig Laidlaw’s try which broke the team’s four match scoring drought, and he really should have had a try of his own, but referee Romain Poite wrongly ruled that the ball had been knocked the ball on as he stretched to gather Nick de Luca’s pass.

It wasn’t enough to prevent a 27-13 defeat to that season’s Grand Slam champions, but it was a moment which hinted heavily that better days could lie ahead. We’re not talking about a one-man revolution here, but the Hawick youngster led the charge as Scotland transformed themselves over the next five years from a blunt instrument with a habit of spending endless phases inside their opponents’ 22 with no idea of how to make that pressure really count, into a side which could deliver a deadly wound from anywhere.

Hogg infused the team with pace and courage. In the five Six Nations campaigns before his arrival on the scene, Scotland averaged 4.6 tries per tournament. That rose to 5.25 per tournament in the next four championships, before hitting 13.25 tries per championship when he and Finn Russell – the twin talismen of the last decade – were at their pomp between 2016 and 2019.

Hogg was added to the starting XV for Scotland’s next match of that 2012 Six Nations campaign, against France at Murrayfield a fortnight later, when he belatedly scored the first of his record 27 tries for Scotland. Earlier this year he became only the fourth male player to reach the 100 mark for Scotland caps, and he had hoped to soldier on to the World Cup in France this Autumn – when it was possible but highly unlikely that he could have pushed ahead of Ross Ford’s record of 110 to become the nation’s all-time top cap holder (if Scotland reached the final and he played in every game of the build-up and the tournament) – but the physical and psychological toll of a dozen years at the sharp end of the professional game meant that it wasn’t to be.

The 31-year-old has struggled with a knee condition (patellar tendonitis) for a number of years and last season had heel and ankle issues too. In April, he revealed that being in too much pain to play with his children had been a key factor in the decision to call time on his career. Both Scotland head coach Gregor Townsend and Rob Baxter, his director of rugby at club level, have managed his game-time in recent seasons, which has not always gone down well with a player whose sense of self-preservation comes a distant second to his competitive instinct. It is going to be really tough for him to now go 'cold turkey'.

Glasgow Warrior Ollie Smith is now the most obvious candidate to wear the Scotland No 15 jersey in France, although Blair Kinghorn is also in the mix after his flirtation with stand-off fizzled out, while Huw Jones has played there in the past. Townsend, however, will be wary of splitting up the midfield partnership Jones has forged with Sione Tuipulotu.

As for Hogg, the next chapter will play out from his base back in his beloved Hawick, and he hinted that media work may feature in his post-playing career when he signed off Sunday’s retirement announcement with the words ‘I’ll see you all again soon’ followed by an ‘eyes’ emoji and a microphone emoji.

Hogg made his debut for Scotland against Wales in 2012.

In the final reckoning, Hogg should be recognised as one of the all-time greats of the Scottish game. He wore his heart on his sleeve, and undoubtedly rubbed up some people the wrong way at times, but anyone who doubts his overall contribution towards sharpening up Scotland’s attack and changing the team’s mentality is not dealing in reality. Over time, he lost some of that blistering pace which made him just too hot to handle in the early days, and opponents worked out ways to manage him better, but he remained a potent attacking threat with ball in hand, while his siege-gun boot and passing ability were often under-appreciated tools in the team's armoury.

A bigger challenge for Hogg appeared to be dealing with some of the harsh criticism which has sadly become part and parcel of being a high-profile sportsperson in the modern world. He played a central role in raising expectations for the team, which proved to be a double-edged sword because he was also expected to shoulder a disproportionate level of culpability when those high hopes were not realised.

He did have a few high-profile gaffes – such as the fumbled try against Ireland in 2020 – and some of these miss-steps were blown-up way out of proportion by the unforgiving court of social media. He was appallingly treated at the end of the 2022 Six Nations when a leaked story about six players – including Hogg and Russell – going to an Edinburgh bar following the Scotland’s team’s victory over Italy was treated like a capital crime by some hot-heads.

Such episodes undoubtedly contributed to the full-back often being a prickly customer when in the spotlight off the field in later years, and added to the sense that this last World Cup cycle has been a struggle psychologically as well as physically. It sometimes felt like Hogg's biggest problem was that he cared too much. Hopefully, now that he is out of the firing line, he'll be able look back on his career with justifiable pride and appreciate how much he contributed towards so many Scots' enjoyment of the game over the last decade and a bit.