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The England player Finn Russell said he would target ahead of Calcutta Cup

Finn Russell, Zander Fagerson and D'arcy Rae of Scotland/ PA

Scotland executed their game plan to pinpoint perfection against England in their 31-20 Calcutta Cup victory in round two of the Guinness Six Nations.

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Gregor Townsend’s side wasted no time before opting to put width on the ball, which paid off handsomely in the opening 10 minutes when a break down the right flank resulted in a yellow card to England wing Henry Arundell after scrambling back. This was a theme that continued throughout the contest.

Finn Russell and Sione Tuipulotu were not afraid to sling the ball wide all afternoon at Murrayfield, and it has since transpired that the Scots planned to target England No.13 channel occupied by Tommy Freeman in the build-up to the match.

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Former Scotland lock Jim Hamilton has since revealed a conversation he had with Russell the day before the Calcutta Cup success, where he said the team would target his British & Irish Lions team-mate Freeman.

In only his fourth Test start at outside centre, it is easy to infer that Scotland viewed Freeman as a potential weakness for England. However, the No.13 channel has been a source of success for Scotland in recent victories over England, with Huw Jones and Russell linking for Scotland’s legendary 2018 try. With England not settled on their preferred outside centre, one would imagine Scotland’s tactic would have remained the same regardless of who had 13 on their back in white.

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“Chatting to Finn the day before the game – how’s it going to go down? How’s the feeling?” Hamilton said on The Rugby Pod.

“He didn’t think it was going to be a high-scoring game, he thought England were going to kick loads and they were going to physically try and impose themselves around the scrum, which they did, that was a worry for Scotland, and around lineout drive.

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“Then I said, how do you approach it from a confidence point of view and how are we going to play. He said ‘we’re going to target the 13 channel, Tommy Freeman.’

“He was talking about the 13 channel and it shows where a team are when it comes to how confident they are in their skillset when, early on, they were running it. They could have gone to the Ben White box kick early on. But the fact that they had the confidence off the back of last weekend against Italy to get into that wide channel, and good was Kyle Steyn?”

This tactic of Scotland’s was only helped by Arundell’s two yellow cards, and England subsequently playing 30 minutes of the match without a winger. That would be a devilish task for even the most accomplished outside centre.

Freeman will find himself in his more familiar role on the wing this Saturday against Ireland at Twickenham’s Allianz Stadium, with Ollie Lawrence starting at outside centre instead.

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Comments

7 Comments
C
CB 44 days ago

When you pick Ford at 10 you know what England's game plan will be. Scotland knew it and even practiced for it on the captains run. When it was obvious that plan A wasn't going to work Borthwicks selection meant there was no Plan B. I fear it will be the same against Ireland.

H
Hammer Head 45 days ago

Is it just me? But should Finn Russell be talking about tactics to the media before a game?


I thought that was a bit strange. Even if Jim is an ex Scotland team mate.

E
Ed the Duck 44 days ago

Similar thing happened a few years ago before Eng v Ita with ‘ruck gate’ when Conor O’Shea and monye were talking a few days before the game. Monye somehow figured out what was coming but resisted temptation to spill the beans. IIRC he did say that it was difficult though…

A
AA 45 days ago

How come Borthwick is oblivious to what is obvious to others .

Unbelievable.

Where is the advice from the rest of the coaches.

Are they afraid to voice their opinions to their boss???

f
fl 45 days ago

what does your comment have to do with the article?

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JW 5 hours ago
New report details source of Ardie Savea's All Blacks frustrations

Yeah it’s hard to be critical of Razor but of choices in his first year of the loosies he constantly played Ardie at 8. It would seem that was always the plan and that Hoskins was surplas to requirements (7, with Dalton then Cane, as was fairly happy with but understand the calls to drop Cane for his last test, along with TJ, and 6 was shared around nicely I thought) and he didn’t have the alround game of Ardie to simply overtake him at 8 (and use Ardie elsewhere). Of course he did that exact thing next year, too late for HS. Then last year 7 was fine if though the same problem was brought about by using Ardie (always leaves a component of a back three missing) there so often stopping Dalton from getting opportunities. At 6 Parker just had one or two too many games for me but 8 was shuffled around nicely, even if I don’t know why Lakai was thought to be the key there.

Of course a lot of rotation was brought about by, you guesed it, injury, still. Now to be fair to Razor, in reality we have no idea if he had to manage Ardie this way, based on NZRs desires with his contract (we have seen them move heaven and earth to retain him), and if he benched him often whether that would have caused him to leave or not. Or even that Hoskins would have accepted a jersey unless it was with a single digit on it, and a regular pick, as he had had to work his way back to the team without a big bump in his contract (of loosing AB selection early on) of other people his standing, so he also might have still put his family and therefor more over the jersey.



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