'It was weird, I was so calm in that moment': Duncan Weir

Barring a freak turn of events, Premier Sports will make their debut as a Six Nations broadcaster at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome on Saturday, and former Scotland fly-half Duncan Weir will be on hand to show off his punditry skills at the ground where he enjoyed his most-famous moment in a Dark Blue jersey.

Weir’s dramatic 40-metre drop goal with 14 seconds of normal time remaining gave Scotland a precious Six Nations 21-20 victory on the road in 2014, their first in nine attempts in the Championship.

The 34-year-old hopes that Scotland will be well over the winning line by that stage of the match this time around, and even if they aren’t, he wouldn’t bank on Finn Russell creating another ‘first’ to go with Premier Sports’ watershed occasion, which, incidentally, includes a simultaneous broadcast on Premier Sports 2, aside from the main production, exclusively using footage from the spider cam.

In 93 Tests for Scotland and the British and Irish Lions, Russell has scored 478 points – through nine tries, 113 conversions, 69 penalties, and precisely zero drop goals.

“I’ve been on the training pitch with Finn on many, many occasions and we’ve been knocking over drop goals and it’s definitely a skill that he’s practiced. I know that I’ve done that a number of times off the top of my head with him,” said Weir.

“I think, for Finn, he’s got such a positive mindset around how he plays a game that he’s always looking to score the try or create something when maybe, everyone else gives up in the hope of creating something, I think Finn backs himself to create that spark, to see that pass that no-one else sees, to unlock a defence through a short kicking game or whatever.

“He has got all the the tools in the toolbox that can unlock a defence. And I think his mindset towards the game is maybe just that he would rather play first. His mindset’s a little bit like that it would probably be the last option in his brain.  That’s what I think anyway, I could be wrong.”

Recalling his match-winning kick, Weir says that he felt almost serene when he received the ball and planted the ball on his foot.

“We were desperate for that win. It was the ‘Battle of the Wooden Spoon’ that day, in Rome. The pressure valve was released within the squad when that sailed over and, yeah, it’s one that I’ve always got some lovely fond memories of.

“It was weird, I was so calm in that moment. If you were to plug me back into that moment, you could probably imagine that your head could take you many different avenues, but I was just so focused on my process of kicking the drop goal, and I’d done some the previous day at the team run in the stadium, so I was completely calm, just process driven.

“I’ve never hit one as well since, so it was a good day. I knew it was sweet, it was a time when they had the Adidas rugby balls, which were like big sponges. When you caught them well, they stayed hit.”

England’s George Ford appears to be on a one-man crusade to bring the drop goal back into fashion, and will no doubt have a crack or two throughout this year’s Championship. But discounting Ford, very few current fly-halves seem to take chance with a drop goal. In last year’s Six Nations, when Ford was restricted to a solitary appearance off the bench in the finale against Wales, only one drop goal was attempted (by Italy), and missed.

“It’s one that’s probably died out the game because a lot of teams are giving up opportunities to to take three points at times. They’re looking to apply their kind of set-piece dominance, at maul time, and kind of trusting their process, which is great in many ways, that teams are backing themselves to execute their drills under pressure. So, I think there’s a little bit of shifting the mindset away from from drop goals at the minute.

“I know Glasgow Warriors and Franco (Smith) would rather go and back his drill if we were down and chasing a score that way, but I think that it’s more cthat the outcomes are so more varied. If they hit the post and then the bounce of the ball doesn’t go your way, the opposition can go the length of the field. So I think in that international scene, if they don’t go over and they miss, then you’re giving your opposition a chance to attack in an unstructured setting, which, with the level of athletes these days, you’re only going to cause yourself a little bit of trouble and it is hard to get back in control of the situation.”

Out of the 13 different countries Weir played against in his eight-year, 30-cap Test career, Italy are the side he scored the most points against (24). He never lost in four outings against them, while fellow Premier Sports pundit, Ryan Wilson, went one better with five from five. And Weir believes the current squad of players will come back from Rome as winners, too.

“I think Scotland are going to win. I definitely do, but everyone’s saying that this is the best team that Scotland have ever had, but I also think it’s probably the best Italian squad they’ve ever had. So everyone’s pumping up Scotland tyres, but, I mean, the last time we went to Rome, we unfortunately didn’t come away with the result. So there’s massive respect for Italian rugby at the minute.

“The star players are getting French teams looking at them and snatching them up left, right, and centre at the minute. So their talent and how they’re going about their business has been trending for the last couple of years.

“They’re the dark horses. Rassie Erasmus thinks they can finish second or third. So, I mean, if he’s saying that, there must be a good reason behind it,” Weir added.

“So, we know that we’re going into a really, really tough match, but it’s also a really good opportunity to kick our campaign off for a win, away from home, and it just tees up the rest of the tournament nicely.”

Scotland, and head coach Gregor Townsend in particular, have heat on them after they threw away winning positions against the All Blacks and Argentina in the Autumn. But Weir looks at the campaign in a positive light.

“People are forgetting Scotland had a chance to beat the All Blacks for the first ever time. And for the first 60 minutes against Argentina, I think it was one of the best Scotland performances I’ve witnessed in a long time. I was in Murrayfield that day and they were absolutely fantastic, except the last 20 minutes. They were the most clinical they’ve ever been and just intensity-wise, it was great. So I think a lot of people forget that when they’re all doom and gloom, which is the Scottish way of thinking about things sometimes.”

As for Townsend, who will reach a century of Tests in charge of Scotland in the Calcutta Cup match against England a week on Saturday, Weir feels the pressure to get three wins or more will only come from himself.

“I know Gregor personally, and I know that he’s striving to win this Championship anyway, so that pressure is always going to be on Gregor to try and to do that.

“I don’t think the added heat of the media or the bubble outside his own expectations and his own ambitions is going to affect him really. I think it was probably good that they had a couple months off after that Argentina lost because there was a lot of heat on them after that result.

“But, again, like I said, I thought they were absolutely outstanding for 60 minutes of that game. Like, I’ve never seen a Scotland dominant performance like that. They were in complete control; they scored some wonderful tries; the defence was good. So there’s a lot of positives for me as a Scotland fan and an ex-player.”

It is one month and a day since Weir last laced up his boots, for Glasgow against Zebre, and moved into an academy coaching role with the Warriors.

“I retired on the Saturday and was behind a laptop and in a coaches’ meeting on the Monday, so it was a short turnaround. But it’s been a great month.

“I’ve had this week off, so it’s been good to kind of decompress a little bit and just unwind and let it all kind of mentally unravel and just really take it all in.

“I’m so lucky that I managed to leave the game that I absolutely loved playing for, for 16 years, the way that I did. Professional sport, it’s a fickle old beast at times and not many people get the perfect send-off in the manner that I did with the Zebre game at home on the 3rd of January.”

Duncan Weir will join Ryan Wilson and Sebastian Negri for Premier Sports’ full live coverage of Italy v Scotland this Saturday starting at 1.30pm on Premier Sports 1. For the first time, in a new partnership with Six Nations Rugby, Premier Sports will broadcast five live matches from the 2026 Guinness Men’s Six Nations Championship across the UK – further strengthening its position as the home of elite rugby for rugby fans which includes the home of EPCR rugby, Top 14 and URC. To join in visit www.premiersports.com