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'Non-selection was the hardest...He just said, 'You're in a competitive position''

By Jamie Lyall
Alex Dunbar

Alex Dunbar doesn’t enjoy looking back – not after the year he’s had, not after the hardship he’s endured. Nor does he dare gaze too far ahead, knowing how quickly those at the top can be walloped off their perch in the savage world of professional rugby.

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His last of 10 seasons at Glasgow Warriors was brutal. Out of the team, dogged by injuries, contract expiring. The beefy specimen who had once been among Scotland’s premier backs had become a seldom-seen squad player as a host of burgeoning centres elbowed him aside.

Light years away from the Test scene as the World Cup loomed, Dunbar went on loan to Newcastle Falcons, where he injured a groin and briefly feared he might have to pack it in altogether. In those grim days, he would torture himself with doubt, dread running into rugby fans on the long country walks that became his escape route.

“The hardest thing was that everyone kept asking me the same questions over and over,” Dunbar says. “When you’re away from rugby, if you take the dog away wandering, the last thing you want to talk about is more rugby.

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“You’re over-thinking, everything runs through your head – what am I doing wrong? Is there anything that’s me? What do I need to change? You start doubting yourself.

“If you’re in for one game, you sometimes feel like you need to overplay. You were making silly mistakes because you felt like you needed to get into the game more. You were running around looking for opportunities to get into the game.”

On Glasgow duty last season, eight appearances and 314 minutes were Dunbar’s lot. He’d be starting one week, jettisoned the next. He was involved in three autumn Tests but as his appeal to Dave Rennie, the Warriors coach, waned, so his international prospects plummeted.

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“The non-selection thing was the hardest to take because when I did play, I didn’t think I played badly,” he says. “Every time we [Rennie and Dunbar] had conversations, I said I needed more game time. Two or three games, you start to get that sharpness again.

“If I could string two or three games together, I felt I’d be where I wanted to be. You get a chance, you’re back out, you get a chance, you’re back out, so I never really got going.

“He just said, ‘You’re in a competitive position’, but the whole squad is competitive. You’d just get a bit disheartened sometimes when you feel you’d played well and you deserved a crack the next week and obviously as things go on you’ve not got much left on your contract.”

Alex Dunbar
Scotland centre Alex Dunbar. (Photo by Harry Trump/Getty Images)
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This lame exit was all the harder to take because of what Dunbar had given to Glasgow. He was part of a young, talented and ravenous Scottish core that grew with the club and helped drive it to the lofty status it now enjoys, winning the Pro12 title, its first major silverware, along the way four years ago.

Finn Russell, Stuart Hogg, Duncan Weir, Mark Bennett, Ryan Wilson, Pete Horne, Chris Fusaro, Jonny Gray and a heap more besides were part of the crop that took Warriors to next level. It is hard to dispute Glasgow’s decision to move on a high-earning player who their coach clearly did not fancy, but to leave as Dunbar did stung.

“Coming up through age-grades and playing for the best part of nine-and-a-half years, it was quite disappointing,” he says.

“I don’t know if it left a bit of a sour taste the way it worked out – it’s just the way it is. It’s done now. There’s no point in dwelling on the last six months-a year. I’d rather remember the good times, playing regularly, some great wins with some great people.”

There is anxiety among Glasgow fans that Dunbar was allowed to depart, that Rennie was too quick to do without him and that the same fate might befall Huw Jones, another wonderfully talented centre who has endured a similarly chastening year.

Alex Dunbar
Huw Jones

Although a brilliant player, Jones has barely raised a gallop in two seasons at Glasgow and has scarcely been seen this term in a backline that, on recent form, is sorely lacking in sparkle. The word is that Jones is keen to get out on loan, but that Glasgow want to keep hold of him.

“He’s a good player, and I suppose similar to myself he’s struggled to get regular, consistent game time,” Dunbar says.

“The couple of games I’ve watched this season when he’s played, he’s played well. But he never really gets the chance to back it up. It’s tough for him because if you’re not playing, confidence, everything… he’s a good player and I fully expect him to get back up to that level where he should be.”

In June, with his future uncertain, Brive offered Dunbar a lifeline, a one-year deal and a much-needed change of scene.

He is only 29 and playing regularly for the Top 14’s promoted side. For the first time in an age, he feels settled and content. There’s still a gnawing, though, an itch to get back to where he was, back in Gregor Townsend’s Scotland team.

After the awful Six Nations and even more heinous World Cup, there is a mountain of pressure on the coach this season. For all that he can call upon a dazzling array of centres, few are as effective as Dunbar at smashing through shoulders and not even Duncan Taylor is as formidable when wedged limpet-like over ball on the jackal.

“We’ve got some very good players, strong ball-carriers,” Dunbar says. “I certainly offer a different dimension with the way I play. A lot of my game’s based on physicality, defensive work, getting over the ball at the breakdown. It’s something I pride myself on. Not a lot of Scottish centres do that.

“It’s the good thing about the squad depth – if we want to play a certain way, we’ve got players that can do that, but we’ve also got players who can play a different way.

“Like I say, I think I can still contribute well and if I get the chance, I’d love to do it.”

WATCH: The Season 5 – Episode 4

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J
Jon 44 minutes ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

This is the problem with conservative mindsets and phycology, and homogenous sports, everybody wants to be the same, use the i-win template. Athlete wise everyone has to have muscles and work at the gym to make themselves more likely to hold on that one tackle. Do those players even wonder if they are now more likely to be tackled by that player as a result of there “work”? Really though, too many questions, Jake. Is it better Jake? Yes, because you still have that rugby of ole that you talk about. Is it at the highest International level anymore? No, but you go to your club or checkout your representative side and still engage with that ‘beautiful game’. Could you also have a bit of that at the top if coaches encouraged there team to play and incentivized players like Damian McKenzie and Ange Capuozzo? Of course we could. Sadly Rugby doesn’t, or didn’t, really know what direction to go when professionalism came. Things like the state of northern pitches didn’t help. Over the last two or three decades I feel like I’ve been fortunate to have all that Jake wants. There was International quality Super Rugby to adore, then the next level below I could watch club mates, pulling 9 to 5s, take on the countries best in representative rugby. Rugby played with flair and not too much riding on the consequences. It was beautiful. That largely still exists today, but with the world of rugby not quite getting things right, the picture is now being painted in NZ that that level of rugby is not required in the “pathway” to Super Rugby or All Black rugby. You might wonder if NZR is right and the pathway shouldn’t include the ‘amateur’, but let me tell you, even though the NPC might be made up of people still having to pull 9-5s, we know these people still have dreams to get out of that, and aren’t likely to give them. They will be lost. That will put a real strain on the concept of whether “visceral thrill, derring-do and joyful abandon” type rugby will remain under the professional level here in NZ. I think at some point that can be eroded as well. If only wanting the best athlete’s at the top level wasn’t enough to lose that, shutting off the next group, or level, or rugby players from easy access to express and showcase themselves certainly will. That all comes back around to the same question of professionalism in rugby and whether it got things right, and rugby is better now. Maybe the answer is turning into a “no”?

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j
john 3 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

But here in Australia we were told Penney was another gun kiwi coach, for the Tahs…….and yet again it turned out the kiwi coach was completely useless. Another con job on Australian rugby. As was Robbie Deans, as was Dave Rennie. Both coaches dumped from NZ and promoted to Australia as our saviour. And the Tahs lap them up knowing they are second rate and knowing that under pressure when their short comings are exposed in Australia as well, that they will fall in below the largest most powerful province and choose second rate Tah players to save their jobs. As they do and exactly as Joe Schmidt will do. Gauranteed. Schmidt was dumped by NZ too. That’s why he went overseas. That why kiwi coaches take jobs in Australia, to try and prove they are not as bad as NZ thought they were. Then when they get found out they try and ingratiate themselves to NZ again by dragging Australian teams down with ridiculous selections and game plans. NZ rugby’s biggest problem is that it can’t yet transition from MCaw Cheatism. They just don’t know how to try and win on your merits. It is still always a contest to see how much cheating you can get away with. Without a cheating genius like McCaw, they are struggling. This I think is why my wise old mate in NZ thinks Robertson will struggle. The Crusaders are the nursery of McCaw Cheatism. Sean Fitzpatrick was probably the father of it. Robertson doesn’t know anything else but other countries have worked it out.

15 Go to comments
A
Adrian 5 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

Thanks Nick The loss of players to OS, injury and retirement is certainly not helping the Crusaders. Ditto the coach. IMO Penny is there to hold the fort and cop the flak until new players and a new coach come through,…and that's understood and accepted by Penny and the Crusaders hierarchy. I think though that what is happening with the Crusaders is an indicator of what is happening with the other NZ SRP teams…..and the other SRP teams for that matter. Not enough money. The money has come via the SR competition and it’s not there anymore. It's in France, Japan and England. Unless or until something is done to make SR more SELLABLE to the NZ/Australia Rugby market AND the world rugby market the $s to keep both the very best players and the next rung down won't be there. They will play away from NZ more and more. I think though that NZ will continue to produce the players and the coaches of sufficient strength for NZ to have the capacity to stay at the top. Whether they do stay at the top as an international team will depend upon whether the money flowing to SRP is somehow restored, or NZ teams play in the Japan comp, or NZ opts to pick from anywhere. As a follower of many sports I’d have to say that the organisation and promotion of Super Rugby has been for the last 20 years closest to the worst I’ve ever seen. This hasn't necessarily been caused by NZ, but it’s happened. Perhaps it can be fixed, perhaps not. The Crusaders are I think a symptom of this, not the cause

15 Go to comments
T
Trevor 8 hours ago
Will forgotten Wallabies fit the Joe Schmidt model?

Thanks Brett.. At last a positive article on the potential of Wallaby candidates, great to read. Schmidt’s record as an international rugby coach speaks for itself, I’m somewhat confident he will turn the Wallaby’s fortunes around …. on the field. It will be up to others to steady the ship off the paddock. But is there a flaw in my optimism? We have known all along that Australia has the players to be very competitive with their international rivals. We know that because everyone keeps telling us. So why the poor results? A question that requires a definitive answer before the turn around can occur. Joe Schmidt signed on for 2 years, time to encompass the Lions tour of 2025. By all accounts he puts family first and that’s fair enough, but I would wager that his 2 year contract will be extended if the next 18 months or so shows the statement “Australia has the players” proves to be correct. The new coach does not have a lot of time to meld together an outfit that will be competitive in the Rugby Championship - it will be interesting to see what happens. It will be interesting to see what happens with Giteau law, the new Wallaby coach has already verbalised that he would to prefer to select from those who play their rugby in Australia. His first test in charge is in July just over 3 months away .. not a long time. I for one wish him well .. heaven knows Australia needs some positive vibes.

21 Go to comments
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