Greig Laidlaw loves the swagger of his Scotland half-back partner Finn Russell and believes the stand-off’s confidence in his own ability can lift the entire squad to victory in their RBS Six Nations opener against Ireland.
As the Irish camp conceded that their British Lions 10 Jonny Sexton would miss the BT Murrayfield clash with a calf injury – key forward Peter O’Mahony will also be absent with a hamstring problem – the Scotland captain admits he’s been watching Russell’s European displays for Glasgow with admiration, laughing off the suggestion that he might be worried about over-confidence.
“Why worry when you’ve got your playmaker enjoying himself and playing the best rugby of his life?” he asked.
“I think it should be encouraged, I certainly know myself I play my best rugby when I’m enjoying it as well.
“Finn brings the best out of a lot of players around him, he certainly does with me, and it’s brilliant to see a Scottish playmaker enjoying his rugby and having a bit of swagger.
“He’s not cocky, he’s just confident in his ability within himself. That’s hugely important for this group of players because he can drag everybody up with him. Hopefully I and the boys inside and around him can help him.”
Laidlaw admitted it had been a gradual process but Russell hadn’t lost any of his sense of adventure.
“I look back to his first cap over in Canada and he was doing chip kicks in his own 22, I think he understands the game a bit more now than he did then,” said the skipper.
“That’s the good thing about Finn, he’s just a quality rugby player and no matter where he is on the field if there’s something on he’ll try anything.
“For me that’s a great attitude to have, he backs his skill set. Working with Gregor at Glasgow has brought his game to a whole new level.
“It’s no surprise that when you get somebody like that in such a pivotal position it lifts the whole team. It brings so much clarity and confidence to the players around him.”
Laidlaw expects either Paddy Jackson – who will not have fond memories of his last start at Murrayfield when he missed a series of kicks as Ireland lost despite dominating the game – or Joey Carbery to fill Sexton’s gap, but still thinks it’s a blow to Ireland’s plans.
“It won’t matter for Finn, but I think Ireland will miss Jonny at least a little bit, he’s a quality player, a great goalkicker and he drives their attack,” added Laidlaw.
“He and Conor Murray have a good understanding and you can see that he’s a lynchpin in that team, he’s the one who drives their attacking game.”
Opposite number Murray is “one of the best players, probably in the world” but Scotland will not shirk at closing him down despite the Irish scrum-half’s complaints at Glasgow’s targeting of him in recent games.
“He surely doesn’t think he’s going to come to Murrayfield and get an armchair ride,” said Laidlaw. “We will be putting pressure in him. Glasgow did as well and did everything within the rules of the game.
“They were trying to get the ball back. They are not trying to deliberately injure a player, and (defensive coach) Matt Taylor is not that type of coach.”
Scotland last year felt they let Ireland off to a fast start in Dublin, and have studied the recent games with the All Blacks as well as Glasgow’s recent clashes with Munster for clues.
“They were interesting and there was a clear difference why Ireland won the first game, because New Zealand’s error count was so high; they made a lot of mistakes in the game, missed a lot of lineouts and didn’t give themselves a platform to launch attacks into the game.
“In the second match New Zealand reduced their error count and were more aggressive in defence, those were what we feel were the two main differences.
“We’ve also spent a lot of time on the aerial game. We looked at that from last year and certainly lost that battle, and we looked at the Glasgow-Munster games and Munster won a lot of ball back in the air.
“It’s a big part of the game and the boys have been hammering into it at the beginning and the end of sessions.”
But Laidlaw knows only too well that Scotland start poorly in the Six Nations – just one opening weekend win since 2000 – and that has to be corrected.
“The first game is so important and we have not delivered that yet,” he said. “Last year we made strides forwards winning two games and we want to win more than that this year.
“It is all in the results, we need to keep the belief and keep developing things to make us win.”