‘It’s not working’ - Gregor Townsend calls for change at Scotland Under-20 level after Uruguay defeat

The continuing crisis that is enveloping Scotland’s ability to produce players for the national side was acknowledged by Gregor Townsend on Wednesday as he called for change in the national under-20 set up.

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - MARCH 19: Scotland head coach Kenny Murray during an under-20 Six Nations match between Scotland and Italy at Scotstoun Stadium, on March 19, 2023, in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Ross MacDonald / SNS Group)

No player has made the transition to the full Scotland team in four years and the U-20s hit a new low on Tuesday when they were defeated by Uruguay in the group stage of the second-tier World Rugby U20 Trophy tournament in Kenya. The loss scuppered Kenny Murray’s side’s hopes of rejoining the elite World Rugby U20 Championship next season. Instead, the young Scots will face the ignominy of attempting to qualify for the Trophy.

As national head coach, Townsend knows the importance of bringing players through and his current squad contains a core who flourished in the U20 side four years ago, including Rory Darge, Ollie Smith, Ewan Ashman, Murphy Walker and Cameron Henderson. However, there have been slim pickings in recent seasons and he believes change is required.

“We know it has to improve,” said Townsend. “We need to get our young Scottish players through in more numbers and quicker. We have to do things differently to what we are doing. It is not working, or has not worked these last two or three years and there are clear learnings out there from the likes of Ireland, France, teams that are thriving at both club, youth and national level. You want all three to be producing players and getting success. These are two countries we can learn from. And we can learn from what was working from us in the past too. We were getting players through in more numbers before.”

Asked if he needed to become more involved, Townsend replied: “It is a responsibility of all of us to do better. We have to do better for our young players. Our players should be better than that. We need to give them more opportunities, more support so they can thrive and not just at the age group level, to come through and thrive at pro level and international level. That youth system should be the lifeblood of any club or international team that is what we have to work to get back to.”

Scotland went into the eight-team tournament in Kenya as favourites but, after beating Zimbabwe and USA in their opening two games, they lost 37-26 to Uruguay in the Pool A decider in Nairobi. It means the South American team will go through to the final to face Spain, with the winners promoted to next season’s top-tier U20 Championship. The young Scots will play Samoa in a third-place play-off on Sunday.

Jim Mallinder, Scottish Rugby’s performance director, who helped restructure the pathway system last year, has backed Murray to continue as U20s coach and head of player transition but also acknowledged change is required. “There is certainly no easy overnight fix, but we’ve already set some plans in place to hopefully improve this situation so we can provide more players to the professional teams and the national team,” Mallinder said. “We’re going to have to work at this plan and really start improving – we can’t keep doing the same things or we will just get worse.”