David McCarthy: I remember Scottish rugby glory days.. now it"s just gory days

I’M going to start with an admission. I’m not a huge rugby fan but I do watch the Six Nations when

Scotland are playing.

I suspect, in that regard, I’m not dissimilar to the majority of the population.

I

have a rough idea of the rules but don’t know enough about the nuances of the game to describe myself as being anything like an expert.

I’ve

never played rugby, never had an inclination to. I’m ugly enough without my nose being smashed across my face or my ears being pulled and

squeezed into the shape of a cauliflower.

But

there was one day when watching Scotland made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up in a way even our football team hasn’t managed.

The

afternoon David Sole walked Scotland onto the Murrayfield pitch with an

air of grim determination before they beat England 13-7 to win the Grand Slam in 1990 was one of this country’s most iconic sporting achievements.

Russell Cheyne/Allsport

David Sole the Scotland Captain leads his team onto the field before the 1990 Five Nations Championship match between Scotland and England

 

I watched the

winning try again the other day but I almost wish I hadn’t. Witnessing the players who created it merely emphasised the lack of ability in the current Scotland set up.

John

Jeffrey plucking the ball out of the scrum and feeding Gary Armstrong, who shuttles it to Gavin Hastings charging up the right wing. Just as he’s cemented, he boots the ball up the line for the slight figure of Tony Stanger to out-sprint the English defence and grab the bouncing ball above head height before diving over the line.

The

scene behind the goal is a seething, moving mass of humanity. Murrayfield at its finest before the corporates sanitised it to provide a

‘sporting experience’ for the businesses who can afford it.

It was all played out to the soundtrack of Bill McLaren’s Borders’ burr and it just seems so much better than it is today.

And

I know this isn’t misty-eyed nostalgia. Twenty fours years on, I can still recognise the names and faces of the Hastings brothers, Jeffrey, Armstrong, Sole, Craig Chalmers and Finlay Calder and yet I was (and remain) an unashamed football man with an interest in rugby that stems only from wanting to see my country do well.

Nowadays?

Maybe it says more about me than the state of the game here, but I would struggle to put a name to the face of any Scotland player.

I watched that game on Saturday, thinking: “What has happened to us?”

I

looked at the ploughed field of a pitch and couldn’t believe a so-called elite match was being played on it but it was the shambolic performance that really jolted the senses.

Scotland were pitiful. Bullied all over the pitch by a team that was younger in terms of average age and in experience.

We couldn’t win our own line-outs and

do you know the percentage of play Scotland spent in the English 22? Let me tell you… 3 per cent.

For the first time since 1978 we failed to put a point on the board against England and got off lightly by conceding only 20. It’s nearly impossible to score nil at rugby but for us nothing is possible. We managed it against South Africa back in November, just to prove Saturday wasn’t a fluke.

That triumph in 1990 was the last time we claimed the Grand Slam and we haven’t won the Six Nations since Italy’s inclusion.

I read another statistic that bellows the word CRISIS. Since Italy joined in, Scotland have lost 52 of their 72 matches.

It’s appalling, shambolic, a national embarrassment.

At

the helm is an Australian, Scott Johnson, who likes to crack jokes but should be packing his bags. Actually, he is – he’s going to become the director of rugby for Scotland Rugby. You couldn’t make it up.

He

will be replaced by a Kiwi, Vern Cotter. But Fearne Cotton could hardly

do worse than the guy who will soon oversee the sport in this country.

Next

up for Scotland is a trip to Rome to face Italy. The loser will almost certainly end up with the wooden spoon and there’s no guarantee it will be Italy. In fact, they’ll go into the game as favourites.

There

will be some who will read this and dismiss it as the words of a guy who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I’m hoping some of the players

and the coach might take umbrage at it and here’s why.

I want them to rip out this page, pin it on their dressing room wall and prove me wrong.

I want them to jump higher, run faster and hit harder.

I

want them to stop giving away daft penalties (16 conceded against England) and I want them to catch the ball when it’s passed to them.

Most of all, I want them to make us a rugby nation again.

Article source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-25055513

David McCarthy: I remember Scottish rugby glory days.. now it"s just gory days