Strokosch gives Scots badly-needed steel

On HIS left arm, Alasdair Strokosch has a tattoo that neatly sums up the way he feels about his rugby, a latin motto – Nemo me impune lacessit – that also appears above the entrance to Edinburgh Castle and translates as “No one assails me with impunity”. Or, to put it into rugby parlance: “If you knock me down then I’m coming after you, pal.”

This rallying cry, so to speak, has company on the Strokosch flesh. He has another tattoo on his arm of the German federal eagle in recognition of his family roots, and another on his back that speaks of where his heart is: “Alba gu brath” – Scotland forever. Certainly, Strokosch did his share to restore his country’s credibility as a physical, if not a creative force, in this World Cup following certain intensity issues against the Romanians in the opening match.

The flanker put in a hugely impressive shift in the back-row and helped negate the power of an enormous Georgian pack. Scotland’s second game in the tournament was always likely to descend into a war among the forwards and Strokosch’s influence in the winning of it has given Andy Robinson and his coaches much to ponder in the week leading up to their third game in the pool, against Argentina a week on Sunday.

Yesterday, Graham Steadman, Scotland’s defence coach, spoke about what Strokosch brought to the team. “When Al speaks everybody listens,” said Steadman. “He’s a deep thinker about the game. You know that what you’re going to get from him is a performance week in, week out. He’s one of the most consistent performers you’ll find. He’ll always deliver. His mindset is so strong. He takes any situation on the field very personally. If a player is going to beat Al Strokosch then he’s going to have to be good because there’ll be no backward step from Al.

“One incident against Georgia summed it up. There was a moment when he was beaten at the base of the scrum by their No 8, because he missed the jump, but he got back in the defensive line and in the next defensive effort he just lit up, absolutely cleaned a guy out of it. This is the kind of response you get. He doesn’t dwell on something if it goes wrong. He uses it as inner motivation and says, ‘Right, next challenge, bring it on’. That’s the kind of man you want.”

Strokosch is a fairly straightforward bloke. Honest, dependable, proud to be here, determined to stay as long as he can. He strikes you as the type of fella you’d call if you were in trouble. He’s a matter-of-fact guy, as evidenced when he spoke up at a team meeting before the Georgia game in order to question the love-bombing of their opponents and their talked-about capacity for physical cruelty.

“We spent a bit of time looking at the Georgians and I thought a bit too much emphasis was being put on how big, how strong and how fast they were. I felt I had to say we had been up against teams like England, South Africa, Australia, Argentina, and defended well and hit all of them time and time again. Coming up against the Georgians should not be a big surprise. The only way they were going to get on top of us was if we were going to let them. The message was that we should make them worry about what we were going to do to them.”

Scotland’s maddening inconsistency has been a recurring theme, the coaches and the players revisiting the subject in the wake of their brush with doom against the Romanians. In fairness to Strokosch, he’s won five out of his last six Tests, but he’s still got a take on this business, an opinion on what makes Scotland take one step forward only to take two steps back.

“We’ve only managed to raise our game here and there. We’ve proved we can beat the best in the world but we have not done it again and again and again. That’s been our biggest failing. That’s where we have to get to. Raise our game one week and do the same again the following week and the week after that.

“It’s all in everyone’s head. We have the physical tools we need to get our heads into it. We did it last year [when backing up a win in Dublin with two wins in Argentina]. That series was the highlight because we came off the back of a great win against Ireland. It was probably the first time we had started to get consistency.

“Argentina are a dangerous team, they have a dangerous pack and they’re mental in the tackle and will chop your knees off every chance they get. They are dangerous out wide. Felipe Contepomi will be one we have to keep a lid on. Get on top of Contepomi and you tend to get on top of their backs. If we can do that and keep our intensity high and work hard at the breakdown, we’ve got what it takes to get on top of them. We need to be a bit smarter than they are.”

Strokosch was always a hard player, but if anything his intensity has increased since he moved south to Gloucester and began immersing himself in weekly dog-fights in the Premiership. That league may not produce the prettiest rugby, but it is made to measure for the kind of games Scotland has in store.

“You play in the Premiership and you have massive encounters every week. You have to go to Leicester, to Saracens, to Wasps and then you have people fighting for their lives at the bottom of the league, guys fighting for their jobs. It does help you raise your intensity and you get used to doing that week after week.”

Robinson now has some selection dilemmas for the Argentina game. Strokosch, Kelly Brown and Ross Rennie looked a hell of a lot more convincing as a back-row on Wednesday than Brown, Richie Vernon and John Barclay did the previous Saturday. These guys are friends, as well as team-mates, but this is a World Cup and they wouldn’t be human if there wasn’t an underlying tension coming into the camp right now.

“I’m sure Andy will get it right. He’s been at it for a long time and knows all about our strengths and weaknesses. Amongst the players, it’s more about a group of 30 going towards the same goal rather him against me. That is how it should be. There has to be an edge as well, though. We’re not going around hugging each other. To get to this level of professional sport you need an edge. We all have it.”

But some are showing it better than others.