Even if the humiliation in Cardiff is going to sting for a long time, Scotland under Gregor Townsend are not going to change – and nor should they.
Scotland may well rebound against France at BT Murrayfield on Sunday. The French are chastened and damaged themselves with a monumental effort coming to grief with Jonny Sexton’s last-kick drop goal in Paris at the weekend. They’re arguably just as bad on their travels as Scotland are at the moment.
Whatever happens, Townsend and his management team have staked far too much in the “organised chaos” style to give it up quite so quickly. The head coach still thinks the high-octane style done properly – clearly, it wasn’t on Saturday in Cardiff – is the way forward.
And whether it’s a naïve and unrealistic plan for the 6 Nations – as Cardiff suggested – is besides the point. Townsend has been appointed as head coach of the national team and he is entitled to impose a gameplan and a style he believes in. It would be crazy for him to change course after the first setback.
The game plan seemed to work pretty well against Samoa, New Zealand and Australia in the autumn. There’s certainly merit in the coaching team’s insistence that this is evidence it can work against anyone – nobody’s pretending that Wales are a stiffer challenge in international rugby than New Zealand or indeed the Wallabies.
However, nothing stands still for long in international rugby. Veteran and savvy coaches like Warren Gatland, Eddie Jones and Joe Schmidt studied Scotland closely after November and Gatland clearly spotted plenty of holes to exploit.
Gatland’s comments that he knew Wales would win by 20 points should be taken with a healthy pinch of salt. He wasn’t directly asked about that or Scotland at all in the after-match press conference, but he said it anyway, seemingly keen to settle a few scores probably related to the complaints from this country about how few Scots he picked for the Lions.
And he was entitled to do so, as nothing the Scots had done in Cardiff had suggested he made a mistake.
Wales have gone until November, anyway, and we shouldn’t expend any more energy on them or Gatland until then. For France, Scotland need an immediate upsurge in morale and perhaps a shuffle of personnel.
The Ali Price and Finn Russell combination at half back is central to Townsend’s plan, but there will be a clamour to recall Greig Laidlaw, and they should do so.
Price’s form this season had edged even before his Cardiff nightmare – most Glasgow Warriors fans will tell you George Horne has been the best 9 at Glasgow this year. Laidlaw is no downgrade and in addition brings leadership, plus the authority to boss Russell around from his more outlandish habits.
Price shouldn’t be ditched, but his energy may benefit from a broken-up game in the final minutes.
John Barclay should be retained as captain, one demoralising reverse does not make him a bad one. But he needs Laidlaw’s back-up and Ryan Wilson’s industry at 8, and there’s a choice to be made with Grant Gilchrist’ ball-carrying maybe required.
In the backs the Chris Harris experiment didn’t work out. Restoring Huw Jones to 13 is a priority and if Alex Dunbar isn’t fit, Pete Horne should be at 12. His best game for Scotland came in a leading role against France two years ago.
Wilson and Dunbar or Horne also probably make defensive organisation better. Sean Maitland, a better defender than Byron McGuigan, will help shut down France’s pace out wide.
A supportive Murrayfield crowd – they are much more forgiving than journalists – will help. A win will restore some ballast. But England and Ireland to come will offer the real indication of whether Townsend needs to either fine tune his adventurous philosophy or abandon it.
