Missing pack pair make tough task even harder

Published on Saturday 7 February 2009 18:58

TWENTY-FOUR hours after the other nations got this year's tournament under way, Scotland will kick-start their Six Nations campaign against the Welsh Grand Slam title holders at Murrayfield this afternoon. Fashionably late this year, the men in blue will hope to be the life and soul of this Six Nations party, having spent the last two washing dishes in the kitchen.

The start of a new international season is always greeted with a heady mixture of hope and expectation, although this year it seemed as if there were firmer grounds than usual for this perennial optimism. Several foreign observers called Frank Hadden's team the "most improved" in the tournament and, while it is possible to damn with faint praise, faint praise is better than none at all.

Sadly for legions of Scots rubbing their hands in anticipation, it seems that today's match will be as much about those who are absent as those who will run on to the field. Injuries to two of Scotland's leading Lions in waiting, Nathan Hines and Euan Murray, strip the home team of the one obvious advantage they had over the Welsh, the front five grunt.

Scotland has some depth at lock but Scott McLeod has hardly played since his "drugs" fiasco and Al Kellock is very obviously out of favour, since the Glasgow skipper has been overlooked in favour of Jason White, a flanker who has played just 50 minutes of rugby in the last six weeks.

If anything the loss of Murray is an even bigger blow to the Scots' cause because he was expected to stop Shane Williams and yes, you read that right. The best way to prevent the Welsh back three from tearing up the Murrayfield turf this afternoon is to block their possession at source. Murray is the most disruptive tighthead that Scotland have unearthed in a generation and cutting the supply of quality ball to the Welsh quick men will be all the more difficult without him.

However, the Welsh line-up is also dominated by the ghosts of two missing men. Gavin Henson, who withdrew from the squad on Friday, is a talisman for the visitors with a unique record in this competition that reads: Played 10, Won 10. James Hook is the other missing body, although the classy fly-half will have a good view of the action from the substitutes' bench and may play his part later on. This pair provide the creative juices that power Wales' back play and without them the midfield is left with a lot of very straight runners. Admittedly, they are big, powerful runners who know how to pick a line, but Stephen Jones, Jamie Roberts and Tom Shanklin don't share the vision of Hook or the handling skills of Henson, either of whom can unlock a defence in a split second. It is better to have the Welsh running at you than running rings around you.

As things stand it looks like both teams have indulged in some role reversal because for years Scotland fielded a kicking fly-half and a hard running midfield. Now Wales are doing just that, while most of the midfield creativity on display this afternoon will come from the Scottish halfbacks and Ben Cairns. With the boot on the other foot the question now is whether the Scottish big men can provide the new-look back line with the quality of ball to do some damage, and that is far from certain. With Andy Powell drafted into the middle of the third row, this Welsh pack is probably better than last season's Grand Slam winners.

Whatever this afternoon's result, the Scots are sure to play rugby. Hadden has finally discarded his comfort blanket of kicker Chris Paterson and opted for a set of running backs, so it is doubly disappointing that he has ignored the final piece of the jigsaw, the speeding bullet that is Thom Evans. Indeed the only bullet flying about is the one Hadden has put in his own foot. The Glasgow speedster is the Magners League's top try scorer and his chasing of kicks, a huge part of the modern winger's duties, is exemplary. Simon Webster and Sean Lamont have a lot to prove this afternoon if their coach is to avoid some uncomfortable questions in the post-match analysis.

At least the Scots can cheer themselves with Wales' record at Murrayfield; it is appalling, with one win in the last five trips and just two victories since 1986. But while the home side can normally rely upon Welsh arrogance to undermine their cause, this lot are singing from a different hymnbook. Time and again the men in red have echoed their coaches in talking up the home team and recognising the "potential banana skin" awaiting them this afternoon. The reports emanating from the valleys last week stated that training has been "brutal" in the run-up to this match and they insist no-one is taking anything for granted. Sadly for Scots fans, Warren Gatland and Shaun Edwards are not the type of men to allow complacency to make so much as a long-distance phone call to this squad.

Instead the Scots will have to nourish their hopes with more meagre pickings. Martyn Williams is one of the Welsh greats but at 33 he is surely past his peak. Stephen Jones is not a natural defender and, having just turned 20, winger Leigh Halfpenny will be welcomed to Murrayfield with some old fashioned bombs. The snow on them this afternoon may even be real. Hooker Mathew Rees is none too accurate at the sidelines and combative scrum-half Mike Phillips is rusty after an eight-month injury layoff.

So much rests on getting off to a winning start in this tournament and this Scottish team has the ability to do just that but to get a result they would need an awful lot of different things to fall into place, which is asking a lot of the fates and a team that is still a work in progress.

It was always a big ask to beat the tournament favourites first up and, without the oomph provided by Hines and Murray, a testing afternoon's work has not been made any easier.