Scotland coach ‘excited’ by Stuart Hogg and Darcy Graham combination

Stuart Hogg is in 'the best physical shape of his life' according to Scotland coach Gregor Townsend as his side prepare to face France and Georgia in the World Cup warm-up Tests. Picture: SNS/SRU

Scotland head coach  Gregor Townsend may be Gala to the core, and one of the finest players to don the maroon of his hometown club, but he couldn’t disguise his delight yesterday at naming two of Hawick’s shining lights in a Scotland XV together for the first time.

Earlier this summer Townsend was MC at Mansfield Park for an audience with the Green Machine’s most capped ever product, superstar full-back Stuart Hogg, and the most promising new diamond mined from its rich rugby heritage, 22-year-old wing Darcy Graham.

Yesterday Townsend had the privilege of handing a 68th and fifth cap respectively to the duo, who will both start in the south of France on Saturday evening as Scotland’s Japan World Cup preparations begin properly after a long summer’s training.

Townsend was clearly brimming with excitement about unleashing his star player, Hogg, and the young pretender Graham in tandem for the first time.

“Stuart has been great. If you were to ask about any player I would give you the same answer,” said the coach.

“We’ve been really impressed with how well they’ve looked after themselves coming into our camp, and also the two weeks’ holiday we gave them after Portugal.

“Stuart’s in the best physical shape of his life, and he’s showing that with the way he trains, the fitness tests he does, with his body composition - the markers we know that show how fit our players are. It’s because of the World Cup and because of where he is as a player – this is his time to be in the best shape of his life.

“Stuart’s not missed many games for us. He has picked up a couple of injuries – with the Lions and at the end of the [last] Six Nations, but he’s usually been available for us and played really well.

“To have him and Darcy working together is exciting, not just for the people of Hawick, but for the people of Scotland. Darcy’s last two games for Scotland he’s scored three tries, and Stuart has been one of our best players over the past few seasons, so it will be good to see them combine over the weekend.”

Townsend couldn’t escape the Gala-Hawick rivalry altogether though as he reflected on the painful memory of having his hopes of playing in the iconic 1995 World Cup in South Africa wrecked by an injury sustained at the home of his club’s fiercest rivals.

“I remember getting booed off the park by the Hawick fans,” said Townsend with a rueful smile. “I hadn’t really had a serious injury up until that point, and I thought it was a two- or three- weeker, so I went on holiday with my girlfriend at the time – who is now my wife – to Ireland.

“There were no mobile phones in those days, so when we came back my mum said I’d had all these messages from the Scotland team manager telling me to get a scan on my knee. I thought: ‘OK, I’ll get a scan but it’s fine – it has improved already over these two or three days. So I got the scan expecting I’d be out two or three weeks, and they said: ‘No, you’ve ruptured your  ligament, you’re out for three months’. So that was it.

“So, it can happen, and we obviously saw it at the weekend, and we’ll be really gutted if our players miss out this close to the tournament having done all the hard work, but we’ll just have to move  on. We don’t want any, but especially not too many injuries.

“It was my last ever game for Gala against those bad  Hawick boys! It was [ex-Scotland scrum-half] Greig Oliver – I tripped over him – apparently it was just in the tackle but … He wasn’t a dirty player, Greig.”

On the injury front, Townsend said that Edinburgh back-row forward Magnus Bradbury was the only concern alongside centre Sam Johnson, who picked up an ankle knock in training, and hooker Fraser Brown, who is hoping to recover from a foot injury in time for the  tournament.

“Magnus got a whack in the ribs from his team-mates in Edinburgh [during a closed-doors training match] the  other day,” explained Townsend. “Both him and Sam we are looking to have them involved probably in the third game [away to Georgia], at a push the second game against France at home.

“Fraser could be available for the final game but the way we are thinking just now is that it would be probably after that – just being available after that.”