Mark Bennett makes his long-awaited return to action and his much-delayed debut for Edinburgh as Richard Cockerill seeks a full five-point bonus victory to keep up the pressure in the Guinness PRO14.
The capital club could make up all the ground lost at the weekend when they lost in Glasgow while Ulster beat Munster, with the Irish province at the RDS to take on Leinster while the winless Southern Kings are at Myreside.
And it’s the ideal opportunity to introduce Bennett, Edinburgh’s big signing for the 2017-18 season but out for 10 months with an ACL injury just a couple of weeks after he’d agreed the move along the M8 from Glasgow.
“He was one of our big signings then obviously he got injured playing for Scotland in the Six Nations,” said Cockerill. “He’s clearly a quality player through playing for the national team and for Glasgow in a championship-winning side, and also on the sevens circuit.
“Huge amount of talent, huge amount of potential – he’s still a very young player in real terms. To get him back and get him up to speed could potentially be the difference in our season.”
Bennett had been “desperate” to play during the last fortnight but Cockerill thought it wuldn;t have been fair to re-introduce him against the club he’d just left after nearly a year on the sidelines.
“I felt it wasn’t quite right that he did that. So he’s been training well, and we’ve been very specific about his rehabilitation,” explained the head coach.
“So he’ll start because he’s ready to start, and however long he lasts, he lasts. If that’s 40 minutes, 60, or 80, we’ll see. I’ll manage him on how good the game is and the weather conditions and all those other things.
“We’ve just got to get him out there. The season’s halfway through, so we’ve got to get him up to speed as soon as we can.
The thing with Mark is that he just wants to get into this team and play well. The national side part of it: Scotland have done well, they’ve got lots of quality there. However, Mark Bennett fully fit, playing well, will certainly be pushing for international selection, I’m sure.”
Exactly a quarter of the Edinburgh’s 28 tries in the PRO14 so far came in the first meeting with the Kings in Port Elizabeth, and if Edinburgh are to challenge for even a play-off spot in Europe five points here is just about essential.
“The reality is that there’s not a huge amount of rugby left (in the league),” continued Cockerill. “We’re at the tail end of the season straight after the Six Nations.
“I want to finish as high up the conference as possible, certainly if we can’t get into the top three then and I want to be challenging for a home play-off to get into Europe.
“It’s important that regain some momentum, that we get the 4 or 5 points on offer from the Kings if that’s possible.
Then we have two games with Stade (Francais) and you’d like to think that if we beat them then that will qualify us for a European quarter-final, if not a home one.”
Magnus Bradbury, limited in game time since his disciplinary issues, gets his chance this week while Sam Hidalgo-Clyne has been given the week off from playing – not from being with the squad – due to the birth of his first son Hugo on Wednesday.
Edinburgh (v Southern Kings, Guinness PRO14, ko 7.35 at Myreside, live on BBC Alba): B Kinghorn; D Fife, M Bennett, P Burleigh, D van der Merwe; J van der Walt, N Fowles; J Lay, S McInally (captain), M McCallum; B Toolis, G Gilchrist; M Bradbury, H Watson, C du Preez. Replacements: C Fenton, E Millar-Mills, M Shields, F McKenzie, V Mata, S Kennedy, C Dean, D Hoyland.
