Nothing to say, yet
Transcription
The Cardiff Central Podcast has special guest Craig Manson, who discusses the Cardiff news, including budget agreements and player signings. The hosts express excitement about the return of Calum Sheedy to Cardiff and discuss the potential competition with Jarrod Evans. They also discuss the recent game between Gwalior Lightning and Edinburgh Rugby Women's team, highlighting the impressive performance of Edinburgh and the impact of players returning to the fold. Overall, the podcast emphasizes the importance of player development and the positive impact of the Celtic Challenge tournament. Hello and welcome to another episode of Cardiff Central Podcast. Once again, it's me, Harley in the hot seat. I'm joined as ever by Kelvin. How are you doing? Yeah, not too bad, mate. Not too bad. Excited about this one. It's been a while since we've seen this guest on. Well, I've seen this guest anyway, so it's nice to have him back. Yeah. So, as Colin's alluded to, we've got a special guest on this week. Now, it's so annoying. We've both interacted with him on podcasts before, but it's his debut for Cardiff Central. From the Scottish Rugby podcast and Scottish Rugby blog, it's Craig Manson. How are you doing, Craig? I'm doing well. Thanks for having me on. It's great to catch up with you guys. We've not talked for a while and now on the new pod. Yeah, it's fantastic to be here. Yeah, it's always exciting to have someone with such knowledge and appreciation of the dark arts and the Scrum. Oh, hold on. Don't build me up on that one, because there's bound to be people listening that are going to go, nah, he's talking rubbish. We did a whole episode on it, I thought, about a year ago today on that. That's true, we did. Yeah, we did. Yeah. I'm surprised you haven't had feedback and people blocking you, you know. Who says they haven't? I just get the people who block and don't make a big fun of dancing, I think. So just going to quickly go through some Cardiff news, first of all. So we had the CS10 Q&A last night with David Allen. Great. A lot of confirmation things. So I'll just go through the highlights. If people want to know more, I'll publish a little list of the minutes I took. So budget for next year is agreed by the new owner. So Dickie Holland, Matt and Neil, the new owner, they're off on safari hunting South African players. Yeah, there's going to be, because we keep getting questions about CAT redevelopment, there won't be a shovel in the ground till July 2028 because of the European football in Cardiff around about then. That's a big one. And apparently they're going to give Matt Barrett a lick of paint. So that's all we needed from that one. Then do you want to go through the signing news, Calum? Yes, re-signing and signing news. So in honour of Craig who went on the pause today, Cardiff announced the re-signing of a whole new front row. So I appreciate you guys about their services, but Domachowski, Belcher and Azzurrati, they're on the front row. Yeah, brilliant news, obviously, to have all three tied down for another couple of seasons. To be honest, one of the things that came out today that I was stunned about was Belcher, only he's appeared 70-odd times in Cardiff. I thought it was in the 150s. It feels like he's been around and performing well for ages alongside the other two who have been brilliant the last couple of seasons especially. And then obviously the big news, bring him home and all that, Calum Sheehy returning to Cardiff fresh from a spell at Bristol. He's coming back because he wants to get back in the wheelchair. And as far as a Cardiff fan goes, that can only be a good thing because he needs to perform to do that. And the competition he's going to give with Tina Sabir is going to be, well, one for the ages, I think, Harley. I don't know how you feel about it, but I couldn't pick at the moment who starts between the two of them, which I think is a really good thing. Well, I mean, I'll go with Sabir because I just think he's been fantastic for us. But pre-season, who knows what happens during pre-season in training. Have you got any opinions on the signings, Craig, having watched the bits of the premiership and the ULC? Yeah, I think retaining the front row of Dermot Chausky, a good player. As you can probably tell with the current front row issues that we have in Scotland, et cetera, I'm always a big fan of keeping your forwards and keeping your tight heads and your loose heads as comfy and happy as possible because you need them. But I think Shady will be a really interesting signing. I know that, obviously, he's hungry to get back into the wheelchair and, to be brutally honest, he's got a very, very good chance of getting back into the wheelchair. So I think that's fantastic. But De Beers, is it De Beers? Yeah. For me, I think what you have to do and what we've tried to do ourselves up in Scotland is you need to keep your 10 that's not qualified for international duties as sharp and as happy as possible because if Shady is going to do what he's going to do, then you're going to need a good 10 that's going to keep you going in the times that he's not going to be available. So, yeah, there'll be a balance in that, I would think. Yeah, the thing I'm most excited about, and we've mentioned it several times, Arlie, is that opportunity to, one, rotate because that hasn't been something that's been used this season, but also, say, De Beers does have a bit of a mere 55, 60 minutes in, which has happened or can happen, then you get Shady to close out the game or vice versa, and I'm just excited to see that. Shady being back in Cardiff brings me good and bad memories. I haven't played against him one time. I was being escorted to the post for the winning game. But, yeah, he's a quality operator and it's great to see him, well, hopefully, back in the World's reckoning and back in the World's shirt in the future as well. Yeah, absolutely. So, and obviously, because we can't predict the future, there are more signings being announced today as you listen to this. So, yeah, as I said, I'm getting paid to stick for us being checkbook Charlies once again, but do you know what? If it's positive news, I'll take the advice. So, obviously, no URC fixtures this weekend, but we did have the Celtic Challenge, and then with the theme of this weekend of Wales v Scotland, we had Gwalior Lightning hosting the Edinburgh Rugby Women's team. I take it you both watched the game. What are your thoughts? Great, I'll go to you first because I haven't seen it again. Yeah, I think it's, I have to watch it and catch up because, as we discussed earlier, I'm kind of busy on Saturdays nowadays, so I don't get to see the games live as much. But I'm really impressed with how Edinburgh have hit the ground running. I'm disappointed that they lost to the Irish team, I've forgotten their name, because Edinburgh had the opportunity to win the league if they hadn't dropped their first loss. But on the other side of things, the coach, Clare Crookshank, has been heavily involved in Edinburgh University rugby. If you know much about Scottish women's rugby, if you look at the Scottish team, the international team, probably every single player has had a coaching session with Clare Crookshank, because a lot of them have come through the A lot of the players that I coached, a lot of them went through Edinburgh Uni rugby as well. So, A, she was a perfect choice for Edinburgh rugby as a coach, but she also can put a team together and that's what she's done. I think also having, there's a lot of people, a lot of players who have been brought back into the fold of Edinburgh rugby that may be playing for professional teams or out at sevens etc, so they've come back at a good time. So, it was an interesting game, big hits, lots of big hits, lots of fantastic rugby to watch and we were given a wee scare and we luckily came out the winners at the end, but yeah, we were given a wee scare. Yeah, you mentioned those players coming back, Lisa Thompson's probably front and fore of those, hasn't she? Has been an international star for years, skull kicking and everything else and Wales, sorry, Gwalior had a couple of players back, obviously Robin Wilkins playing, but they were missing. Nell Metcalf and Kath Richards have both been huge for them through the season because they were with Glossary Heartbreak and I think that did have an influence on the game if I'm honest, along with Gwennon Hopkins who was incredible a couple of weeks ago. She's a real star in the making, I think she's under 20 still so she's going to be a huge player, but I guess for me frustrating for Gwalior because how good the season started with those back-to-back wins to then go back-to-back losses is a bit, they're now fourth on the table having looked in a situation where they could even win the league or be in a position to be top of the league. Edinburgh are now obviously four points behind Waltham and on top of the table, but yeah, I suppose overall in the tournament it's a better question how good it's been because otherwise these players weren't playing. A lot of the Glossary Heartbreak girls that are Welsh players haven't been playing for Glossary and I don't know if it's a similar situation in Scotland where a lot of your international players haven't been playing in the premiership? For me, I'm quite lucky. Two of the girls I coached at younger ages and also with our local team were in the Edinburgh squad at the weekend and played. We followed them for a long time and what we're finding is that what they found when we did the original one with the Thistles and we played some Celtic matches, the step up from age grades and what we call pathway up with us, one of the players had said, look, the difference in gameplay and difference in just sheer physicality was night and day when we went to play for the Thistles and they found the same again with Edinburgh, which is what we expect and what we want. The big problem is us having all of our Scotland internationals away playing at Harlequin's, playing at Bristol, playing at Exeter Chiefs is fantastic, but we're not developing our youth players and bringing them up to speed and this is where Edinburgh Rugby has come in. From what I'm hearing and what I'm getting sent back to me, it's been incredibly useful for them. Someone like Molly Pullman, who played at Tightheads on the weekend, we've known Molly since she was six, seven, eight years old, showing the boys how to tackle and she's just been fantastic. She's on her way, I 100 per cent think she's going to be making it into the Scotland squad. She's in the age grade Scotland squad and she's Edinburgh through and through, she's been a supporter all of her life and she's absolutely loving every single minute of it. She loves the physicality and that's the big thing I think. We're now starting to see that link of, this is Scottish rugby and you'll be finding the same with Welsh rugby. You'll see this link of, you come through from your clubs, you play for your top level club rugby and then you get the opportunity to go to your big teams and then you get the chance to go into Scotland. I think that's what we've been missing in Scotland, because everyone had to go away and play rugby for Harlequins or even just down to Darlington or when they were around etc. It is from over the moon, it's fantastic to see and you'll be the same yourselves I would think. You mentioned that moving away, it was quite vocal, the WIU were quite vocal about saying to the players, you have to move. You couldn't stay in Wales and continue playing and now there's this opportunity to play in Wales and play at a higher standard. It might not quite be at the premiership standard, it's not yet so let's be frank about it, but there are plans for it to grow. I know there are whispers of a North Wales team being included in the Celtic challenge as well, so Wales would then have three teams. I don't know whether there are similar plans in Scotland to have a third team, or is it a bus play? No, at this moment in time it's going to be just Glasgow and Edinburgh. I think for costs-wise and different things, we might as well just piggyback on to Edinburgh and Glasgow. If we keep it tight and we keep it to two teams, there are more opportunities for girls and women to be paid. If we start talking about a third team, you start diluting the cash pool. The sooner we get Edinburgh and Glasgow players being paid to do their soldier work. We have talked about this regularly, about women's rugby. For example, you mentioned Lisa Thomson. If you look at her passing and kicking skills three years ago, and you look at her now, now that she is being paid to do a job, and that is all that she is thinking of and doing, her skills have dramatically increased. It is almost as if paying someone to do a job and not having to worry about doing another job and then getting to the gym and getting to training and doing all those different things. Imagine that. They have been able to focus on their skills. For us anyway—I am sure that you are seeing the same—the upskill of the players has been dramatic. If we can get a URC-style competition built as quickly as we can for women's rugby, which is one of the biggest growing sports in the UK, we can get them being paid a decent wage and get them playing. That will help our senior teams and our national teams. Yes, it is definitely the case. It is an interesting one about that, as well as the quality and improvement. In Wales, the two teams have slightly different feels about them, the two Welsh teams. You have got one team which is full of internationals in the pack, especially Worcester Warriors players that obviously no longer have the contracts, the likes of Sean and Harry, the likes of Alex Callender, that have been given an opportunity to play. Then you have Gwalior, which is perhaps seen more as a development team. Have you been a bit surprised by the performances of the Welsh side? Outwardly, Wales, of these three nations, have been the best international side over the past two or three years, but it seems that their performances have not been backed up at this level. Have you been surprised by that, or were you expecting Scotland and Ireland to perform better? No, I have been more surprised by Ireland. If we look at the headlines and the conversations that we have all had privately about women's rugby and how we feel that it is incredibly underfunded and undersupported, yes, I am surprised that Wales and the two teams in the competition have not done as well. However, on the other side of things, I am not surprised, because Scotland and Ireland are very similar. We send all our players away to play professional rugby, and they are the ones who come into the international squad. Our under-20s and under-18s are not getting the amount of game time that we need them to at the level that we need them to, so we try to put those teams together. I hope that Adele Ferrie does not mind me talking about her, but Adele Ferrie played at Loch on the weekend for Edinburgh. Adele Ferrie was in the women's premiership in Scotland, and she was someone who had decided that it did not look like it was going to happen for her and that she was going to look at other things. She has worked incredibly hard and she has done a fantastic job of getting herself back into the opportunity of playing for Edinburgh. However, she would have had to have got picked up and gone away to one of the big teams to get some sort of remuneration out of it and to develop, so she still has not got that ability yet. However, with Edinburgh and Glasgow starting to build, I hope that that will happen. There is still a gulf, but our younger players who are coming through who only know rugby do not know about having a job, having to go training and building all of that together. They will do incredibly well. It is the players that we have now that we want them to get the opportunities. They will be the interesting ones to watch. I think that they are the ones who hate to see it. They do not fit into the team as well as the age-grade players who are coming through. I am not making myself clear, but I am trying to talk about it at times. I was surprised that the Welsh team is not performing as well and that the Irish team is performing so well. There are two Scottish teams. One has a coach who is absolutely fantastic and has been plugged into Scotland international players for a long time. Glasgow has not had that and has underperformed. We are all playing in that mix. It is interesting. I suppose the Welsh side have a similar set-up in terms of experience. You have Ashley Beck, a less experienced coach, who hasn't performed as well. I am not putting the blame on him at all, but I am just saying that he is the less experienced coach in terms of this. Then you have Cat Nicholas McLaughlin, who has obviously been part of the set-up at times and has been part of the fabric of women's rugby perhaps for longer. That has had an influence. There is another interesting thing with the Welsh side. It seems to me that there are a lot more players who are playing because they have chosen to stay in Wales and not move to England recently. I know of one player, for instance, who was in the Six Nations squad. I spoke to her at the time and I said, you know, you have made the Six Nations squad following the Celtic Challenge. You have done brilliantly. Well done. Top job for you. Performing brilliantly at a local club. But she didn't want to make the move to England and is now part of the development side but hasn't yet had a Wales cap. Perhaps for that reason she hasn't made the jump to England. Do you think the Celtic Challenge is still a stepping stone to playing in England? Do you think that it will always remain that or do you think that it will eventually be able to compete with England? That is a really difficult question to answer, but it is the age-old question, isn't it? The bottom line is money. We have talked about it so many times and we have mentioned it already. Mind you, you look at Jake Conkle, who is still a firefighter and played for Harlequin, so we cannot turn around and say that it is all about money. However, I think that there is still a fairly big difference. If we can get to a point where we end up with a URC-style competition, we might be knocking on the door. However, as I said, having discussions with some of the girls who are playing for Edinburgh, it is a big step up. If you think of the team members of Gwalior, who are then going to play for Harlequin, you will probably find that it is a big step up. There will be certain things that are equal or better than them, but I think that the physicality, because of their training and eating schedules, they are treated as professional clubs. There is still a little bit of gulf at the moment, but all I can do is celebrate what is going on just now, because it is something that we have been talking about for—when was the first time that I spoke to you, Farwen? It was two or three years ago, and we were desperate for something like this. Now that we have it, we have to celebrate it and make sure that everybody who is interested in rugby and wants to watch women's rugby gets down to the live games, puts their hand in their pocket and buys a ticket, and supports the TV and watches it, because if we do not do those things, they will have an excuse not to continue on and fund it. One thing I am always interested in hearing people's opinions on is that, in a lot of respects, the women's game has been following the path set out by the men's game. In other situations, it goes completely different. For this formation of the Celtic League, it started off as one of each, now it is two of each. We are talking about, do we expand to a third or a fourth team? Do you think there is a really good chance to learn from the mistakes that the men's game made? In Wales, we had the whole issue of picking four, then we ended up with five, and now we are back down to four. Lots of people are not happy with it, for one reason or another. In Scotland, you had the Borders region, which I know is a bone of contention for a lot of Scottish rugby fans still. Do you think this is going the right way? Sorry, Ciarán—I do not know whether you had a follow-up question. For me, yes. What is good is that they are trying out different things. For example, having the women's six nations on a different time schedule would be great to have at the same time, because all the infrastructure is there. For example, Edinburgh played the Wolfhounds an hour or so before the 1872 cup. Scotland bungled that completely at the SRU, because they only limited it to one stand. There were 1,730-odd tickets, and they sold out two days before the fixture and would not sell any more tickets, because everyone was too busy looking after the 1872 cup and staffing it. What they should have done on that particular day was to open up and buy a ticket on the door. If you are there early, get yourself a pint and go in and watch the women's game first. Then you come out, cross into Big Murrayfield and watch the Edinburgh-Glasgow game. I thought that they missed a trick with that. On the other side of things, a lot of women are telling me that they do not want to be involved with the men's game—they want to have separate days and so on. On the other side of things, I think that they tried it two years ago or a year ago. They were resetting scrums quicker. If they had one reset, that was fine, but the second reset was straight because they were looking for speeding the game up a little bit. I like the fact that it is almost treated like a younger game. You can try things and see whether they will work and forge your own identity, rather than hanging on the coattails of the men's game, which you really do not need to do. The other thing I would add is that the main thing has to be sustainability and financial sustainability especially. The Worcester situation was horrendous. Taking it as a Welsh perspective, there were seven internationals or something in that Worcester side, two of which were having ATL recoveries and in the middle of ATL recoveries. There was an interview with Fiona Lewis where she said, who on earth is going to take a player that is coming back from an ATL injury when the club is not best? No one. The priority has to be sustainability. I really do like that they have built one, two and then maybe three if there is the market for it, if there is a possibility for it. That is something that I do appreciate. It feels like they have taken learnings from the previous system. Let us be honest about it. In the current rugby market, they have to look at that as a priority because we are talking about a system that we want to have in place for 10 years and not two years. That is the thing that I really want to stress. This has to be sustainable for a long-term future for these girls and the women who are coming back into Wales and want to stay in Wales as well. I am a guest on your podcast—that is fine. I totally agree. From the outside, a lot of us look in at Welsh rugby at the moment and do not know what to say or do, because there are times when, automatically, we think that four regions are too much and that we should have one less professional team. That is going to give up this amount of money, which will then go in and make sure that those guys are paid enough. I am sure that we could have a podcast—you have probably had them—and you could have another podcast and talk about this completely. Again, we are talking about women's rugby and we are now talking about men's rugby. Wales has a fantastic women's rugby team at the moment. They are built on the amateur game, and they have invested before Scotland did in having player contracts and so on. They have the ability to move forward without swearing, so please do not mess it up and do not grow too quickly. Just keep your two clubs—just as you say, Ciarán—sustainable and provide, as much as they possibly can, high-level rugby and, I hope, high-level care for the players that they have. Then, start selling their shirts to fans. There are far too many international squads that do not sell women's fit shirts. Scotland has its own sponsor and everything on its shirts. I do not know whether the Wales squad is the same. Let us get them sold as well and start building that sort of thing. I would far rather see a lot of girls and women coming to Scotland with the women's national team kit on. All those things have to be looked at, but please do not repeat failures of the men's team. I want to pick up on the kits and merch, because it is something that Huw from Scarlet Fever brought up when he was on Pirate Rugby Pod. You cannot get these shirts—actually, I quite like the Gwylie Lightning one. I quite like that blue and amber thing. It kind of reminds me of my home town, Barrie. With Barrie Town, they play in blue and yellow. But the other thing is that they all only have one kit, which is really awkward when three teams play in red. I do not know if you have seen—I think it is the Clovers who are the Munster-Connacht mix. When you have them and Edinburgh or Brisbane, it is just really awful. I remember watching the Brisbane-Edinburgh game, and I could not tell what was which. It was a bit like that—do you remember that Champions Cup game against Glasgow, where we both had this sort of weird bluey-grey shirt and it was foggy, and everyone was passing the ball to each other? There was an Ireland-South Africa game as well, and Ireland came out in almost camouflaged green tops as well, did they not? That is the thing, though. This is what tracks me up. You are spending all this money on producing an Edinburgh squad, and all these different squads are at least having a wee shirt. The thing is, to me, even if they just went, everyone has a white away shirt for now. That is it. You have your home strip, and then if there is a clash, you have the white one. I believe World Rugby are funding the whole tournament at the moment. It is not necessarily the unions. I do not know if the unions put in as well. I want to say something simple with you. How many colours are there in the rainbow? I just feel like it could have been a way—I know everyone wants to play in their representative colours—but there could have been a way that everyone has a different colour and it does not clash. The Bristol on Edinburgh game was horrible to watch, because it was spread on orange all game. The Edinburgh men's team have two different kits. They have an away kit and a home kit. I have bought kits before for women's teams and for men's teams. They are about £1,000 for 23 jerseys. In the long run, that is not a lot of money. Come on, guys. We pay expenses to some of the male rugby players far more than that just for fuelling their Range Rovers. We need to get a bit of real here and get it sorted out. Edinburgh, as much as I do not like the kits, they have got it sussed on how to do a home and away. They have a dark top and light shorts and they invert it to the other kit. It is such a simple solution for some teams who think, we are normally blue and black, so for away we will be pink and black. That is what kits used to be. I do not know if you both had the same thing, but when I was growing up, if you had a kit, you had to turn your top inside out. We used to have a stripe on the middle. We used to have a random stripe if we ever played another school team. If you ever go to a Stumell game, they are private schools, that is fair enough, they have got plenty of money, but they have got reversible tops. When they turn up to a game and they see that they are clashing, they just turn their tops inside out and they have got a different strip with the same. It is all the same, just inside. It seems simple enough, but again, it is this whole thing of, they do not seem to think out. Edinburgh Rugby, the women's team, we will have to get them a set of kits, but we have only got 26, so nobody gets to keep them. Some players are going to look stupid in that one, because it is too big for them. Come on, lads. That then gets us on to boots, and that then gets me absolutely raging, because we have professional players who play for Scotland, and I am sure that Wales has the same crowdfunding and looking online for sponsors for their boots. Then you have got players out there who have sponsorship deals and their kit suppliers give them 20 or 30 pairs of boots a year. You think to yourself, surely Adidas or Canterbury or Nike or whomever could go, you know what would look really good on my marketing campaign? Edinburgh Rugby or the Clovers or someone with all-in-hour boots and there are advertising campaigns and they look at us and say, I just do not understand, 23 or 24 pairs of boots? How much is that going to cost a manufacturer? It is crazy. Anyway, I am on my high horse, mate. On that subject, we have all seen the amount of ACL injuries in women's sport in the last four or five years. I am not an expert in this field, but there is plenty of literature on all the dangers of wearing wrong-sized boots, wrong-sized equipment, along with turf issues as well, but that is one to talk about. If anyone wants to read that, please have a look into it, because we are speaking about a situation that in some instances could definitely be avoided. Boots that do not fit are just ridiculous at this level of sport, at any level of sport, but especially at this level of sport. Absolutely. Just to wrap up some of the Celtic challenge stuff, the table as it stands is we have got the Irish Wolfhounds on 19 points at top, Craig's Beloved Edinburgh on 15, Clover's on 14, Gwalior Lightning on 11. It is Britain's Thunder with a solitary point in fifth, and with Neil Poire is Glasgow, which I suppose is conflicting for you, Craig, because I know you love to take the piss out of Glasgow, but I know how much you love women's rugby as well, and would not want to see them languishing. You have hit the nail on the head, because I was just thinking about it, and I was thinking, yes, Edinburgh is at the top there, we have got the opportunity. There are a lot of players who the team that I used to coach have probably played against who now play for Glasgow, and again, they have just had a bad time of it. I think that it is just little things like that. They do not look as linked or as cohesive as some of the other teams. Give them a year, they will get themselves sorted out, I am sure, and we will have a little bit of a closer competition. We do not want to be in a situation where we have big teams putting bigger scores on teams. We want to have a close competition, like we did at the weekend, and it was a bit of a nail-biter, which we all love. Fingers crossed that Glasgow do a bit better, but as long as they do not do as well as Edinburgh, I am happy. Absolutely, and then we have got the final preliminary round, and then it is a very complicated knock-out stage, which is so complicated, they have not actually announced it or officially confirmed what is going to happen. All we know is that it is going to be two triple-headers. Starting off on Sunday at half-past twelve, Edinburgh hosting Clovers, on wiki it is called Edinburgh Rugby Stadium, I am guessing it is the Hive. It is the Hive, yes. That is a shot to, at the very least, secure second, possibly win the title, but that will depend on the next game at half-past two, which is the current leaders, Wolfhounds, hosting Gwalior Lightning. So, if we could pull off a fantastic away win, I am sure Craig will buy us all points next time he sees us. Oh, come on Gwalior. And then it is a bottom-of-the-table clash between Brisbane Thunder and Glasgow Warriors at Arraies Stadium and Colwyn Bay, also at two o'clock. So, if anyone is interested in watching, the Edinburgh-Clovers game will be on BBC Scotland, the Brisbane Thunder-Glasgow Warriors will be on BBC Sport Wales, Gwalior Lightning-Wolfhounds will only be on Rugby Pass TV, and obviously you can watch the other two games on that for that, should you choose. I think that is a parking for the Women's Rugby for now. Shall we talk a little bit more about the, you know, the game that does not get anywhere near as much interest, obviously, or too much, depending on who you ask. So, if we talk, so obviously it is Wales-Scotland this weekend. I thought I would just be, as the teams have been announced, I do not know if you have had a chat, because I have given a surprise Craig on this one, but the under-20s, so I just wanted to sort of flag up that we have got two blue and blacks in the starting line-up, being Harry Wells and Lucas de la Rua, who obviously has had a bit more senior rugby than the other, so hopefully they will go first, plus several ex-Cardiff Pathway players, I did have them all written down and I have closed the tab because I am daft like that. Who is your Hennessy as well, is he not? I know Hennessy is part of the Pathway, but I did want to name all of them without remembering all the rest. I just wanted to say on this, I mentioned it yesterday on the Welsh pod, but I am so happy, happy to see Harry Wild, I am really excited, there is a lot of people talking really highly about this kid, and to get the opportunity to show what he can do, because best to be frank about it, next season he is going to have more people to compete against if he wants to get into a Cardiff regional side, so really excited to see what he can do at the under-20s level especially, and we all know what de la Rua, Mawson, Hennessy and Ackerman can do already, but let's see where the big lads in that pack as well. Yes, so I think we have been told to keep an eye out for Chapman and Scott, they are supposed to be quite interesting prospects off the bench in the under-20s, also for the best name to come out of Welsh Rugby since Tame Basham, hopefully in terms of how they start playing at under-20s, we have got Owen Conker in the number 19 jersey, so I will be honest, I know nothing about him, but I am looking forward to finding out because I love the name. Yes, I have seen a bit of him, he is a good player, surprisingly he is on the bench, so yes, he is a good name. Another one is Max Page in the back 23 jersey? Yes, I was speaking to Steph Thomas from Wales Online yesterday, he was speaking very highly, well saying that people at Scarlett's level are speaking very highly of him coming through their pathway, so plenty of talented individuals to watch and let's be honest, I will be drafting the Wales side within two or three years, so we will keep an eye on that game on Friday night. Absolutely, so from the Scotland point of view, any names that we should be looking out for? I think at the moment, the biggest focus for Scotland certainly is Robbie Deans and Ollie Boy Flafferty at Loos and Tighthead. We have got a couple of backups coming in, especially Callum Norrie at Tighthead on the bench. Callum, I have known since a young lad coming through our squad at the Howard Five, so he has worked incredibly hard to get to where he is. I think for us, we are focusing a lot on the front five players because we do certainly have an issue with front threes, so certainly if you keep an eye out for them, I think also Fergus Watson at 15 is someone to watch as well. Obviously, Liam McConnell as well, the captain in the back row, is someone to watch. There are lots of different things to see. We will see what happens. Our issue is that these guys are not getting a lot of game time, so our concern is that we put them into the super six competition that we have up here, the buffer between pro rugby and club rugby, and we put an under-20 Scotland future side in against all these Stirling— Oh, an under-20 future 15. I was wondering what that was all about. Yes, they were our under-20s players and unfortunately they were beaten royally by every single team, so this is the big issue we have with Scottish rugby at this point in time as our pathway. I am hoping that they have stopped the leaks and their defence is coming up a little bit more. I think we will hopefully give a better showing of ourselves. Let's be honest about it, that's the situation Wales were in, especially 12 months ago. We were going up against France, who half the team were playing as a pro d'oeuvre, especially Tui Lange, and you had the Welsh players who were getting minutes, but now they are starting to get minutes. You've got the likes of Morgan Morse, Harry Ackerman, especially getting regular minutes in regional rugby. As bad as the situation has been in Wales, the positive is that the younger lads, who are under-20s as well, are getting the opportunity to showcase their skills at regional level and hopefully that will improve the under-20s team as a whole. I suppose that must be the same situation in Scotland, but with only two teams, they are slightly more limited with the opportunities that they are going to get at regional level. There are a lot of people who—the big issue that I have, and we have talked about it before in our pod, is the fact that the under-20 players who are getting game time at pro d'oeuvre, if you are going to learn how to play rugby and learn physicality and learn to keep your eyes and ears on your face, you are going to learn that in the second professional league of France. That is where a lot of people feel that, in Scotland, our under-20 players should be playing regularly in the premiership amateur squads. They should be going out and playing against—the props should be playing up against 45-year-old guys who are trying to fold them in half on a regular basis and so on. The issue is whether they go there and look fantastic, because the level of rugby is a lot lower in the non-professional game, or whether they go there and are taught a lesson. Those are the questions that you have to see where they are at the moment. The problem with Super 6 was that the money got involved, so they started bringing in older players who were not using the younger players coming through, so they were not getting the game time. That has been the big issue that we have had. In Edinburgh and Glasgow, they will use a smattering of younger players, but the pressure is on, especially in Edinburgh, to perform better than eighth or twelfth on a regular basis in the URC. For example, we have had players who have moved along to Glasgow from Edinburgh because they were not getting game time, and all of a sudden Rory Darge is an absolute superstar. People are being missed because of the way the set-up is at the moment, so we will have to see. I do not want to bring up one point, because you brought up the Super 6. We are looking at setting up our own equipment, which started off being called the Super 8, and now it is going to be the Enhanced Development Competition. How do you think that has worked so far? Do you think it is mostly gone? Do you think there are still a lot of kinks that need to be worked out? We are in our fourth year, and it is very close to being binned in Scotland. If you guys can make it work, everyone can look at it and say, and we will try to work with you. The Super 6 has really promoted Scottish rugby and pushed it. It was on TV, BBC Scotland and BBC Alba, and people have slowly lost interest in it. They have stopped promoting it as much as they used to, and there is talk of it being shelved. There are a lot of people who like it, but there are a lot of detractors from it. I liked it, because it was there to try to take away from the premiership teams that maybe had sugar daddies come in. For five years, they brought in paid players and won a competition. The sugar daddy would then fall out with the committee at the club and take his money elsewhere. The club would then descend down the leagues very quickly. They were trying to stop that. I do not think that they have fully stopped that yet, but there does not seem to be a discernible link between playing for the Super 6 and coming up and playing for Scotland, or at least playing for the professional team. What tends to happen is that professional teams will put players into their Super 6 teams to get back from injury or to give them game time to keep them sharp. It is not being used as a development tool, but as a way to put someone to get them better or to keep them playing and keep them interested. I do not think that it is being used correctly. That is the big learning to take from it, if you know what I mean. Thanks for that one. As I said, one of the things that I said with Carlos is that the three sides that we thought might not necessarily go into it have all been worried about the revenue point of view. We are looking at teams coming up, whereas I think that it would be better if you make a team underneath. I think that that is the idea that they wanted for this. It is for the academy boys and then for rehab. You might have a few senior premiership type players that you can nurse and guide them through. That was keenly where it was supposed to be in Scotland as well. The big problem, and I will say this whole-heartedly as strongly as I possibly can, is that we had four franchises from Edinburgh to the Borders—one in Glasgow and one in Stirling. Dundee had tried to become a franchise and it was turned down. There was another franchise from North Inverness Way, for example, and it was turned down. There were two or three franchises in Glasgow that were turned down, and it ended up being Ayr. For example, Ayr is a good drive out of Glasgow. When you are trying to promote the oval ball rather than the round ball in Glasgow, which is a big job, you want teams playing. Unfortunately, the SRU, in their right minds or their wrong minds, were very much Edinburgh centric and going with established teams. That has been a big issue as well. Thanks for that. I know that wasn't something you planned on talking about, but I thought it would be disinteresting to have an outside view on what most people thought was actually a good idea in Welsh rugby, and maybe give people a few seconds to... Just be careful. This last part of the pod, if we talk about the game that's happening on Saturday, Wales will be hosting Scotland. I know you said Edinburgh then. I think there's a few more regions. There's a few Glaswegian and English based players going into that. We'll be on their Saturday. As we've got you on, Craig, I was just wondering if you want to give a little bit of a preview. Maybe start off with just the overall Scotland squad. It's the most settled squad to come into it. It's the only one with the same 10 from last Six Nations. As I said, most players from their World Cup were retained. It's not a particularly old squad. I was having a quick look and there's only two players older than I am and maybe two of the four who are about the same age as me. We're fairly settled. There's a couple of missing players. We've got Darcy Grahame who's out with a hip injury. Funnily enough, you're looking at the possibility of Kyle Steyn, who you would think would fill his boots. Kyle Steyn, as we saw with the Six Nations last year, was a very good fill-in for a different player to Darcy Grahame, but a very good player to have come in. Blair Kinghorn. We all know Blair Kinghorn and we all know the story of Blair Kinghorn and the Blair Kinghorn experiment at 10. He's now out in Toulouse. He's doing a very good job out in Toulouse. He's going to come in with his tail up and will be ready to do some damage. The tried and tested Hugh Jones and Suoni Tuapalotu will probably stay, because Jones has been playing very well. There's been a lot of talk of Hutchison and Cam Redpath, especially Finn Russell and Cam Redpath, because they're playing together at Bath on a regular basis. For me, I haven't seen what a lot of people see in Cam Redpath, so we'll have to see where we are with that. I might just hear my hair out of that comment. Redpath and Hutchison are two of the sexiest rugby players I've ever seen. I just love the way they play the game. They float around the pitch. When you say that, do you like the directness of Tuapalotu, who to be fair has a lot more flair to his game than just direct playing? I don't mean to simplify it, but he can just truck it up if need be as well. In modern day international rugby, it seems to be that we need someone either at 12 or 13 who's got a bit of heft about them and will take a sharp line. Don't get me wrong, Hutchie playing at Northampton Saints, I agree with you. He's like Damien Pannull. They look like they're going far slower than they really are, and they've got a silky smoothness. If he's on his game, his hands are fantastic. If he's slightly off colour, he can be a disaster at times, but I think that's what's kept him out of the Scotland squad. I argue about this regularly with Johnny McGinty and the guys on the pod. We're not talking about the backs now, we're talking about the forwards. We talk about Johnny Matthews, at the moment, within the first season of his main season in Glasgow, he's on well on his target to almost hitting the top tri-scorer mark already. Everyone's saying, why isn't Johnny Matthews in the Scotland squad? He should be starting in the Scotland squad, because he's so fantastic. He's a tri-machine. The jump between playing for Glasgow and playing international rugby, where Johnny Matthews survives very well off the back of a very good Glasgow mall. You're not coming up against great mall defence all the time when you're playing in the URC. When you're playing international rugby, you're coming across the best in that country's defensive mall. I think that's where, for example, Cam Redpath and Hutchie have had more of an issue. They've come up against maybe a stronger defence than they're seeing on a regular basis. Playing at Bath, I think Bath have been phenomenal this year. Cam Redpath and Finn Russell have both been playing incredibly well. The same with Baylis, for example, who's at Bath. But they're not knocking on the door of the Scotland squad. I'll finish, but we can talk about him more and more all you want. I loved Cam Redpath. Maybe two or three years ago, he looked phenomenal, but that was because he was a highlight in a Bath team that was a bit average. I may be completely proved wrong, and I hope that I am. Maybe not this weekend, but throughout the six nations, he may come in and he may be absolute. They may both come in and be superstars. At the moment, they'll go with Trident Trusted, and that's Tupelo Ortega and Hugh Jones. Then we'll go from there. I reckon you'll see Ali Price start, because I don't think Ben White is playing particularly well over in France. You'll see George Thorne on the bench. He's a terrier, just a life force in the game. He'll come in and give you some oomph in the second half. Forwards, well, who do you want to start with? Our front rows are going to be very strong until you get on to the bench, and then that's going to be trouble. You're probably going to see 80 minutes out of Xander and 80 minutes out of Pierre Schumann. There could be a chance of that. I agree, maybe on Tite's side, obviously, Nell is a huge loss, but I assumed it would be Hepburn. Hepburn is a decent player. Obviously, he had his span in the England jersey, and he'll make of that what he will, but he has been consistent for Exeter, has he not? I actually looked at the Scottish bench, and I thought, with the absence of Nell, that's a strong bench. You've got your Ashford or Johnny Matthews, a hooker. You've got whoever you choose in the second row as the bench, because I think all three are pretty strong. Back row, especially, you mentioned Baylis, but Baylis, Christie, Ritchie, whichever one you take, if there was an athlete down, Ferguson, obviously, as well. It's interesting to see that. Are you not sold on the Hepburn coming over? I think you may see Jamie Barty on the bench, just because he's tried and trusted and he's been to the World Cup. Unless Hepburn comes in and has set the camp alight, but really, when I watch Hepburn play, he isn't a shoo-in. He may knock Barty off the bench, because I think he's—this is going to sound terrible, because I know that Jamie Barty has had a lot of problems with mental health and with body image issues and things like that. He has talked about it before, but he is in the form of his life at the moment. Barty is playing incredibly well for Glasgow and he looks as good as he has ever looked, but I think Hepburn looks fitter. You can only go by what's happened in camp, and we don't know what's happened in camp, so we'll have to see what happens. The big thing is that Jamie Ritchie wasn't named captain and has been told—as we've heard on podcasts and so on—that Gregor Towns is not guaranteed a spot, so he can't be named captain. That's one of our best fetchers and someone who has saved Edinburgh's back side on a regular basis. That's a really interesting conversation to have about back row. Darge is obviously going to start, because he's vice-captain—or he's co-captain. You'll probably see Christy in the mix. You'll see Dempsey, the old Australian. He'll either be on the bench or he'll be starting. Then you'll have Ferguson to come on. Ferguson has been playing back row as well as number 8, so you might find him on the bench. We've got a lot of fantastic back rowers available. Luke Crosby is so strong and so powerful. I think I've given you 10 minutes on the Scotland team, and I apologise for the balance. It looks like a balanced squad, but there's a lot to talk about. You touched on my question, because I was going to say, who becomes the aged Australian? Hepburn is older, and although he played for England, he's originally from Australia. You can always call him the aged Englishman. For me, the aged Australian is someone who's played for Australia and has said that he only got emotional playing for Australia, not for Scotland. He gets off on doing a good job for Scotland. Here's my two pence on that one. I've always felt that Matt Ferguson is a far superior player. I think it was two years ago in Cardiff. He's immense. Yes, Matt Ferguson is a very good player. There you have someone who—this is nothing against Dempsey—is not only as good as Dempsey, but he's playing with a lot of heart as well, rather than his head. I'll tell you another player who misses out on a regular basis. Mr John Anderson on our podcast constantly pulls me apart for it. For me, Magnus Bradbury is an out-and-out superior eight. In the days of now, we've got three back rowers who can play three positions, and sometimes Sam Skinner has a lock as well. That's maybe what's limiting Magnus Bradbury, apart from also being stripped of the Edinburgh captaincy because he got drunk and went on allegedly fell off and got into trouble with Richard Cockerell. Magnus Bradbury is a fantastic player, and he has really blossomed at Bristol. I think that's someone who I feel has missed out on the opportunity. We've brought in someone who has come through on the rule of three or four years not playing for his own country, and now he's here. I find that a difficult pill to swallow. That's why I'm maybe more negative about Mr Dempsey, but he has done a very good job at Glasgow, so we have to consider that as well. I think that's another podcast in itself. It should be worth reiterating that people who do re-qualify, it has to be a birthright thing. In a theory, we could have chosen the right country the first time round, just in case Manuel Faber-Bose, who's listening, does get his England cap. It's all right. We'll have you back ready for the World Cup. Yes. I'm one of the biggest defenders of Pierre Schuman, who is out and out. He qualified under residency, so I can't really point the finger at players and say, this is terrible, or whatever. I just think that there are two other players there who could have had more opportunity to play. Again, Scotland are very good at punching above their weight, because they'll take anyone who is the child of some sort of Scottish person somewhere in the middle of nowhere. We have spread ourselves wide all over the world. I thought you were going to say spread our seeds, and I thought that was going to be a bad choice of words. I mean, it was better than what I had in my head. I think that might have been quoting John Anderson on the Scottish rugby pod at one point. I won't go into it, but I might tell you what I was thinking off there. It's similar with Doohan, isn't it? Because obviously he's as South African as they come. He's played against his brother at international level. Edinburgh gave him the chance when he thought his rugby career was over, and he's sort of repaying that. When you hear him talk about playing for Scotland, you do get that passion that Craig says he may have alluded to as missing from another player. I did forget one player as well when we were talking about Tighthead, who has been training after a knee injury, and that is the one and only Javan Sebastian. I can just hear Johnny McGinty swearing. I'm about to go on to the pod with the boys, and I can guarantee there's going to be plenty of conversation about Javan. I actually think he's pretty decent, and John Anderson doesn't, so that's a different story. He's been training with the squad, so you might find that Miller Mills won't get his opportunity. You might find that Javan will be on the bench as well. The biggest compliment I can give to Sebastian is the chalk and cheese effect as he hit the Scarlet Scrum end of last year and Scarlet Scrum this year. He was brilliant at holding up that Scrum during the Challenge Cup campaign against Claremore, even when Claremore had an interesting interpretation of the substitution of the prop rules. I've never! Honestly, he's brilliant. He was superb at the end of last season at holding up that Scrum. From our perspective, I'd probably look at it a bit enviously, considering the inexperienced three Tightheads that Wales have currently, but Aserati is obviously playing brilliantly, but the other two aren't playing much rugby. I'm switching it to not that I'm continuously obsessed with Wales, but do you look at this Wales side with a feeling of optimism and hope because that's an inexperienced Wales side and all this, it's quite evident that it is a new cycle and lots of injuries, or are there players in that side that you think, oh, I'm a bit worried about him, I'm a bit worried about him? I'm not so worried. I'm going to give you plenty to talk about now. Honestly, in my heart of hearts, I feel we're coming down to slap you around. In my heart of hearts. I think we should, we should expect to walk into the principality and shove you around the park like we did at Murrayfield and that's that. Okay. So please don't write in just yet because I have got a but here. There are some players in there that I think will do a good job, but I think we will overcome that. That's a Scotland turn-up. And this is the big question. We've got the principality who, as everyone knows and everyone talks about, is as good as the fans that are inside it. Wales will play as well as the fans inside will support them. So there seems to be some sort of voodoo or something happens as you walk under, as they walk into the changing rooms, it changes them around. And Wales also, if you tell someone they're rubbish enough over a period of time, they will come out and slap you for it. And Wales could do that. And so we're always got the fear. We always have the fear. So, yeah, I think, I think if Jack Morgan was playing, I'd be worried. And I'm not saying he's the only player. I think, what's the second remote place for rassing? Will Rowlands. Will Rowlands. You know, he's got, he's got the ability there. He can, he could, you know, he's a good line-out operator as well. And as you know, Scotland aren't the best line-out, don't have the best line-out. So if you've got a savvy line-out operator, you've got the opportunity to upset us a little bit. You've got, yeah, I'm in a real juxtaposition at the moment because we really, really should come down and win this and win this correctly and win this well. But it's the hope that kills us with Scotland. We all, you know, and that's probably why we get the reputation of we're all talking no trousers, because we like, we get ourselves built up into this. Yeah, of course, you know, we've just talked about, we've all just talked about Scotland. This is the best settled squad of Scotland. This is probably the best Scotland side we've ever had, ever had. And it takes Finn Russell to miss a couple of kicks and then all of a sudden, okay, he is, he is fallible, there is problems. Then you've got Hugh Jones misses a tackle. Oh no, the old Hugh Jones that can't defend comes back. You know, Xander gets an injury, so we've now got Javan on and everyone's saying, oh, that's a scrum, absolutely knackered. You know, all these different things that come in and it just all of a sudden, and if you watch, not so much Glasgow, if you watch Edinburgh play, if Edinburgh get in their own heads, they've lost the game and they'll give up stupid tries right at the end in the last 20 minutes. So yeah, to answer your question, I've gone in a long, big looping roundabout way. I would love to say to you right now, yeah, we're coming down and we're going to beat you and we're going to do this and we're going to do that. You just don't know, and I would be very worried to say that that's going to happen. I'm looking forward to it because it's my first time at the municipality this weekend, so I'm really, really looking forward to it, but I'm hoping we're coming home with a win. It's going to be a long drive home if we don't. What do you guys think? Oh, go on, I'll start. Again, I'm quite nervous about this. I know we've got the whole thing of Gatlin doesn't lose in Cardiff to Scotland and things like that, but I'm not sure we've got, necessarily got the experience where we need to for various other reasons, you know, and at the front row, there won't be a lot. As much as I love the work to them, Domoszewski and Azarati, they are very raw, you know. Azarati's only got two caps, Domoszewski's got a few more after the World Cup. Then you've got Leon Brown, who is the most, I think he's the most experienced of all the props we've got in the squad. I mean, Gareth Thomas might have just about overtaken him there, but he has 23 caps, pretty much all of them off the bench, and he spends 90% of the season injured. And when he is fit, he gets absolutely turned inside out. So that worries me quite a bit. A lot of positive talk about Archie Griffin in Bath, and I, you know, I admit he's only in the third, he's only in the third choice, but similar to what I said about Reece Litterick at Queen's, you know, you don't get to be the third choice prop in one of those teams without being decent, because they've got plenty, they can, they can turn up or they can just buy someone in. And, you know, and he'll be, you know, and he's been learning off people like Thomas Latoy and Will Stewart, you know, scourging up against Ben O'Bannon, you know, some very good, very good props. So hopefully that will cheer things up. I think it's going to be interesting what we do in the second row, because obviously David Jenkins and Ian Captain, but Adam Beard and Will Rowlands are such a great lock pairing, and I think they balance the other quite well. And then back row, I think is, I think we've pretty much nailed on Raphael at seven and Wainwright at eight, and now it's who do we pick at six? Do we go for the more traditional blind side, who's also a bit of a line-out option in that man, but he's untested? Do we go for a dual open side with someone like James Botham, who's almost a Josh and Naveed-y mould? Or, you know, I think something's been touted as Tame Basham, you know, who's quite a hard, quite a hard carrier. You know, if we're to create that again, then we lose more of the line-out, which, if it's a struggle for Scotland, it's an absolute impossibility for Wales at times. So I think our pack's going to be, as I said, I think if our pack can get anything close to parity, then I think we're in for a good close game. Back line, you know, again, we've got some bits of experience with Gareth Davis, Thomas Williams at scrum half, Tompkins North sitting in the centre, Josh Adams I imagine will be somewhere along that back three, but again, he hasn't been blamed much. So it's going to be a bit of a worry for us, I think, because our experienced players are either not on form or have spent quite a lot of time in mood at the moment. Yeah, I think Raphael, you know, to really answer Carwyn's question, I think Raphael is someone I would fear. He's playing very, very well for Leicester. He is, again, someone who can, if we've got you in your 22 and we're knocking the door down, as we always tend to do, and not spread it wide, he's someone who can save that by turning it over, you know, taking a penalty. He's absolutely ferocious at the breakdown. So, you know, there's someone who can turn the game. He can turn the game. So, as I say, we're definitely not coming in cocky, that's for sure. Yeah, just on Raphael, there are some murmurs that he may not be, that he's close to not being fit, slash not fit. And, yeah, in the absence of Morgan, he's a huge loss. Oh, he will be. Who do you think it said in that case? Would you go for both, or would you? Yeah, I'd go both. And I said this off pod too, but just fashion disciplinary record in recent times has just not been good enough. There's not much else I can say. The challenge against Leinster is appalling. But the main thing I would say about this game, and I appreciate we've got time, but the main thing I would say is that for the first time in a while I look at that bench and I think Scotland's bench is much stronger than Wales' bench. And I appreciate that's partly down to experience, but you've got returning players like Watkin who hasn't played international rugby in a couple of years, possibly appearing on the bench. You've got the likes of Yohan Lloyd or Kaye Evans possibly appearing on the bench or even Payam starting, as might be the case depending on where the situation is at the back three. It's the bench that worries me more than starting line-up. And I'm a big fan of Ben Healey, and Adam Hastings is playing a bit better with Gloucester, but I think I'd still stick with Ben Healey as a substitute 10. At times with Scotland it used to be stop Finn and then stop Scotland, but now you've got Ben Healey who can change a game and play in a completely different way. And if you've got Tam Redpath or Hutchinson on the bench as well, you've got so many options of what you can do differently to change the game, and that worries me. In short, I still, as I did two years ago, will take my say that it's the bench that puts the fear of God in me, to be honest. There may be—I might be proved completely wrong here, and maybe I'm hoping too much—but there may be a bit of a flyer on the bench, and that is Harry Paterson. He's a young lad who plays for Edinburgh. He's one to watch for the future. He's incredibly strong on the wing. He can play full-back, he can play wing, and he's good on the high ball. Almost to his detriment, he's a little bit too—what's the word? He doesn't care too much how he ends up. He'll just go for a ball and then end up concussed or broken at the side of the pitch. He is fearless, that's the word I was looking for. I would like to see him getting a cap. I don't know if it's going to be—I don't think it'll be against Wales, but it could be. He is that sort of character. There are little bits and pieces there. As we've talked about, it's a real difficult one to call, because you've got some of these players, like Botham, for example, who was talked about as one of the guys coming through and then was completely discarded. He's got something to prove. Whether he goes off on his own and gets himself into bother because he's trying to do it all himself and prove something, that could be a problem. If he plays within the team and works hard, like Wales can do, they can frustrate Scotland with their defence and their heavy hitting. You're not looking at a cocky Scotsman here. You're looking at someone who is coming down to watch a real—it'll be a game. If we do win, I really do feel that Scotland will pay the price for it, because they'll have to put a lot of work into it to get the win. Hastings, unfortunately, is injured, so it's definitely going to be Ben Healy, who has unfortunately lost his kicking boots for Edinburgh at the moment. We'll have to see where we go from there. That's not necessarily the case, but I know Townsend quite likes keeping thin on for the full AT and then using King Horn as the cover if needed. Given that we've only had two senior Six Nations scores announced, both of them have gone 6-2, do you think there's any danger of Toonie following suit with that one? Do you think he'll have enough physicality with the more traditional 5-3? I'm going to say this, and it's not meant the way it comes out. I don't see the Welsh pack being as physical, so we'll go with a 5-3. However, I don't mean that they're not going to be hard-hitting, because they always are. They always put a great defence in and they're always incredibly frustrating to play against. You're probably seeing a fitter and leaner Welsh pack than the old-style Welsh pack, which would just smother you to death. If you're going up against the old-style Welsh pack, you might put a 6-2 out, but at this point in time, I would expect it to be a 5-3. We need to break down your backs a bit better, because that's where the difference is going to be, apart from if Toonie Ruffell is playing. Having Tomkins and George North in the midfield, etc., you've got a hard job trying to get through those guys, apart from George North's glass jaw that he has. He's not been sticking that out very often lately, so we'll wait and see. I think either way you go, we're looking at probably going to be a lot of inexperience. I'm glossing over the George North one. I was literally biting my tongue. Looking at our back three options, obviously, Riyadah is probably a pure thing to start with. Adams is going to be playing with no Zamek. We're going to be looking at, is he going to be covering at the start and at full-back? Is he going to be on the wing? We've got a new untested player at full-back, whether it's Kai Evans or Ewan Lloyd, I'm probably more inclined to go Kai Evans. Points-kicking, I think, is tactical-kicking games a lot better. Ewan Lloyd is a bit too fond of just running into traffic and getting stuck at the bottom of the rack, which frustrates some members of the rack family. So then you might be looking at, does Mason Grady end up coming onto the wing? That could be interesting as well. I would actually quite like to see Mason Grady versus Dewan. I know, if anything, they'd probably be playing on opposite wings. They both like coming in field to run around a bit. I don't think Dewan has many players who are about the same size as him. Yeah, but the problem is that Dewan has lost a little bit of his... I don't know. Carwyn is currently pointing sideways. There are times with Dewan, and if you look at him, especially that try against England, if he actually pins his ears back and just runs, he's going to break tackles. The problem is that he went out on the Lions tour and South Africa put two men on him all the time, so he had to try and come inside, but unfortunately he's brought that habit into Edinburgh and also into the Scotland game. So instead of pinning his ears back, he's looking to stop and drink sideways. And all of a sudden, he drinks sideways and then all of a sudden now he's running more and more inwards. It frustrates a little bit because Dewan should be doing what Dewan does, and that is get the ball and pin your ears back. Or someone kicks the ball through and he goes after it, or he chases on the kicker and scares the bejesus out of whoever's trying to catch the ball. We'll wait and see. Just a quick one. I personally would pick Adams at fullback because I think Grady has to start. I think Grady has to start. Dyer's going to start because Gatland loves him. Adams will probably start because Gatland also loves him, and I just feel Grady has to start because of the way he's been playing recently. I'd love to see him on the wing playing as well as Jasper Kaif, and then that is battle royale because Kaif is a brilliant winger as well. I don't mean to disrespect him, but if it is Dewan versus Grady, that is a battle royale and a half. The big difference is going to be defence because Steyn is a far better defender than Dewan. If it's Dyer against Dewan, then I would be a little bit more frightened of that because Dyer's got more of a step and more pace. No matter what anyone says about Dewan, he's got a lot of pace, but unfortunately he's like a tanker. He has to build that up and try to get him to turn. It takes about three and a half miles to get him to turn around. If you're looking at Dyer on the wing up against Dewan, I think that Grady will have more of a handful with Steyn than he would with Dewan. Who was it that said the same thing about James Lowe? I'm trying to remember, was it Ashton? Someone said it about James Lowe. Yeah, someone said it about James Lowe. He's never forgotten it. It's one of those two, isn't it, who Brian Havana is on about his opponent being slow on the turn. I said, because I don't want to keep you from your own podcast. Also, the Ospreys are recording after us and I got told off for saying fucking last time. I'm going to play nice this time. Fortunately, we didn't have time to go over the community side of things, but briefly, big wins for Cardiff and Ponte Prese at home and the Rags will be playing tonight as this pod goes out at Cat, so get down there. Rags games are included on the Cardiff season ticket, as are the age-grade games, so make the most of it. Don't complain that there's not enough home games, we've got plenty. So all that leaves me to say is thank you to my co-host, Carwyn. Jafar. And thank you once again, Craig, for taking time out to come and talk to us about Scottish and Edinburgh rugby. Not at all. Thank you so much for having me. And if I've rambled on too much, please excuse me. I'm just excited about the weekend. I think you all are. So and then all it leaves me to say is thank you all for listening. Good night. Good night. Thank you for listening to the Cardiff Central Podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. Please subscribe, rate and review wherever you listen to us as it really helps spread the word. You can find us on all usual social media channels or email us on welshregionalrugbypod at gmail.com. And remember, whatever the question is, rugby is always the answer. See you next time.
