'He's got some good potential': Glasgow confirm interest in Force back

Glasgow head coach Franco Smith has confirmed Warriors are working on a deal to bring versatile Western Force back Bayley Kuenzle to Scotstoun next season.

The 27-year-old Australian is his fifth season with the Perth-based outfit and has started eight of their nine Super Rugby Pacific matches this season – five on the wing and the last three at inside centre.

Kuenzle made his breakthrough as a fly-half in three years with the ACT Brumbies before joining the Force in 2021 and has been used in both centre positions and on both wings in recent years.

Scotland and British & Irish Lions centre Huw Jones – who is joining Toulon – is one of half-a-dozen confirmed departures from Glasgow at the end of the season, including fly-half Adam Hastings and No.8 Jack Dempsey.

Reports in Australia suggest Kuenzle has already agreed a move to Scotstoun, although Smith was reluctant to confirm any deal.

“I’m not sure what they’re writing about there. I’m trying to stay off the news!” he quipped, before admitting: “Look, there’s conversations with a player like that. It’s the same with (Bulls centre) David Kriel (a previous Warriors target who is reportedly heading to La Rochelle instead).

“It’s a discussion point at this stage. I think he’s got some good potential. He’s one of the candidates that we are looking to bring over.”

Kuenzle was called up by Australia in 2024 but an injury prevented him from playing for the Wallabies.

Smith recently confirmed that he was looking to bolster his largely Scotland-qualified squad with two or three foreign recruits for next season.

The only confirmed new arrival so far is back-rower Ruwald van der Merwe from South African side Pumas.

But Smith said that with some experienced stars moving on and a host of younger players coming through, the average age of the squad would be lower next term.

“This is a four-year cycle,” he said. “We’re coming into a fifth season with me (since his arrival in 2022). We want to keep on progressing, you know. I love the boys here, but we also realize that their value goes up and their opportunities grow. And to compete with a global market and keeping everybody in our environment will cut our throat.

“You know, we’re only 38 players. But with an established process, significance will lead to success, but significance is not negotiable. And to be significant, some of the players that we proudly have shares in their future will go on.

“But with the new generation, the Johnny Ventiseis, the Fergus Watsons and Ryan Burkes and all the young boys that we’ve introduced, we have to look at taking the product forward.

“We need more players. The team selection is hard with injuries, the Six Nations, the fact that we’ve competed in both competitions to have a quality product for a significant or sustainable time. We need to make some executive decisions.

“We have been building every year here but we want to continue the growth and continue making more players eligible for Scotland going into the 2031 and 2035 World Cups. It can’t stagnate, especially in a two-franchise rugby system.”

With Scott Cummings – one of four Scotland locks currently unavailable – not quite ready to return, Smith has handed a first Warriors start to 21-year-old second row Burke against the Stormers in Cape Town on Saturday, after he made his debut off the bench in last week’s 54-12 thumping by the Lions in Johannesburg.

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25 Apr 26

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“It’s obviously a big occasion for him,” Smith noted. “The fantastic part was that his grandfather, who drove his rugby dream for a long time, flew over to come and see him play this weekend and it brought some tears into the changing room.

“We’re really proud of that. So that’s a win for me already. The fact that we have these young players living their dream and going to play in front of what could be 30,000 people tomorrow in a stadium like that.

“That’s part of our journey, part of the belief that I want in Glasgow Warriors. He came to us very raw. He basically had only height that counted in his favour. But he’s worked diligently over the last couple of years to become a really good rugby player. I’m excited to see him becoming another option for us going forward in that role.”

In a similar vein, Smith commended Stormers counterpart John Dobson for selecting emerging Junior Springboks centre Markus Muller on the bench for the clash between the top two in the URC at DHL Stadium.

The 18-year-old, who has already been involved in alignment camps with the senior South Africa squad, will become the youngest-ever player to represent Stormers, a couple of weeks younger than Damian Willemse was in 2017.

“I think the whole country wants to see him,” Smith added. He’s been to alignment camps with Rassie [Erasmus]. I suppose there’s a lot of expectation. There’s never a right time for this, so why not now? It’s still three or four weeks away from the play-offs. There’s enough time to maybe unearth another option.”