Weir willing to do what’s needed to take the next step

DUNCAN Weir may have been the young pretender having his first taste of international rugby in the RBS Six Nations Championship, but he has emerged from the tournament in pole position with Glasgow and determined to make a concerted push for Scotland’s No 10 jersey next season.

Weir’s priority is to steer Glasgow to their second appearance in the RaboDirect PRO12 play-offs in three years and, as he enjoyed a day off from training in the sunshine yesterday, his mind was turning to the prospect of facing Dan Parks and Cardiff at Firhill tomorrow night.

The teams will be named today, but Weir is expected to start after a good display against Aironi at Firhill last Friday and knows another victory would keep the Warriors on track and almost kill off the Blues’ hopes of catching them.

He said: “Hopefully, Dan will be playing because, at this stage in my career, I’m looking for challenges and, when you’re learning about controlling a game, there is no-one better than Dan at that.

“If I am selected it will be a great opportunity to test my tactical kicking against one of the best game managers in the business.

“This is a huge game for us, but so are all the remaining four before the play-offs and the guys have been working really hard to push each other. There is a real determination to push on and win these games and get into the play-offs.”

Weir’s season has followed the pattern he hoped, from taking advantage of Ruaridh Jackson’s involvement with the World Cup in pre-season and the opening two months of the campaign, pushing on with improved displays in the Heineken Cup, getting a call into the Scotland squad in the Six Nations and finally coming off the bench for his first cap against France.

He duly scored his first international points and, having suffered with a shoulder injury last year after stepping up to Scotland A level, he deserves all he has achieved.

Weir will turn 21 in May, so he is just over three years younger than Jackson, who came through his own injury-enforced delayed development.

Now both are fit and improving, Jackson sharpening his kicking game after just a handful of appearances this season while Weir responds well to the challenge of leading the back line more, taking the ball flatter and asking questions with ball in hand. Both are also working on finding the balance necessary to control games, but that only comes with match experience.

There has been talk among supporters of one of them moving to Edinburgh to get that most precious of commodities in a stand-off’s development, game-time.

But, with Harry Leonard and Gregor Hunter coming through at Murrayfield and Greig Laidlaw the man in possession, there is no such move being discussed by the SRU. What may be of greater benefit could be for either Weir or Jackson to move a postion out to inside centre, in the way Matt Scott has done with aplomb at Edinburgh.

Jackson could be the kind of player who would take to the second five-eighth role of a centre with a head-up approach and game skills of a stand-off and has played there at Scotland A level.

Both are also competent full-backs and, if Stuart Hogg was to be deployed in the role that many envisage for him, as a new threat at outside centre, perhaps the No 15 jersey on the back of Jackson or Weir could bring the best out of all three players.

That kind of thinking may by in the mind of Gregor Townsend, who will take over from Sean Lineen as Glasgow head coach next season and who himself played in various roles at international level.

Weir said: “It will be sad to see Sean go because he has been great since I joined the club but I’m looking forward to Gregor coming in because I’ve worked a lot with him over the past year.

“Gregor working one-to-one on skills is fantastic and he has been great to work with in the Scotland camp. Having learned so much from Sean I’m sure I’ll learn a lot from Gregor as well.

“Me and Jacko have joked about that [switching positions], to make sure we both get in the team, but there hasn’t been any chat with coaches about it. If I had a choice of starting on the bench or starting at inside centre or full-back I’d definitely take the latter because I just want to start and I think there is a lot you can learn about the game from playing other positions.”

He added: “Obviously, at the moment I’m just trying to learn more about stand-off play at the highest level. Playing against France was a great experience and I’ve learned a lot from being involved in the Six Nations squad, little things from the coaches about things I can work on to improve my game, and what’s needed at international level and how you have to be able to justify the decisions you make. I know the results weren’t that good but, from my point of view, the team played well in almost every game and could have won all of them if little things had gone right.

“The hype around the tournament was fantastic and the experience was great overall, but I have to forget that and work hard to take the things I’m learning into games and improve.

“I was pleased last week with the way myself and [scrum-half] Henry [Pyrgos] controlled things and put pressure on Aironi, and now we have to build on that against Cardiff and take Glasgow forward again.

“Then, maybe, in the future I’ll get to experience more days like the one against France.”