Odds, Sods, and Lions Centres

After all the excitement of yesterday evening, tonight Edinburgh take on Cardiff at Murray field (not on TV, but probably on BBC Radio Scotland along with a lively debate about future Scotland coaches from 8 p.m.), while Glasgow visit Llanelli live on S4C on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. with a few more of their internationals back.

A couple of good games from Thom Evans could see him shoot up in the Lions reckoning, which would be nice.

Also with one eye on the future, Ruaridh Jackson is starting at 10 for Glasgow with Parko, still without a contract for next season, on the bench.

Edinburgh should also have newly resigned and restored prop Geoff Cross packing down in the scrum, but not against Cardiff’s Gethin Jenkins, who is rested. Cross will be looking to make up for his inauspicious test debut vs. Wales in the Six Nations, one hopes.

Speaking of the future, Edinburgh and Glasgow seem to be scouring the English club game for Scottish-qualified youngsters with former Stew-Mel and Newcastle scrum-half Ross Samson signing for Edinburgh, and centre Peter Murchie signing for Glasgow from London Welsh.

Samson’s signing and Ben Meyer’s exit from Edinburgh means Edinburgh now have only one non-Scottish qualified player on their books (Ben Gissing).

At the other end of the career spectrum, former Edinburgh scrum-half Graeme Beveridge also announced his retirement from pro-rugby after he was let go by Bristol. He aims to have a go at coaching in the future though, so we wish him all the best with that and hope to see him plying his trade north of the border soon.

Andy Henderson is also off to newer pastures in Montauban after a game for the BaaBaas—it was getting crowded in the Glasgow midfield I suppose.

After their exertions last week in victory over Connacht and loss to Munster respectively, good to see a few home-based Scots creeping into the (only half serious) Sky Sports Lions Watch team of the week, as well as a few exiles.

In fact this team is almost thick with Scots—who’ll never last.

Big Stroker is definitely increasing the awareness of his physical talents, while I’m sorry to have missed the battle between Euan Murray and Gethin Jenkins in the scrum, plus the comments on these things are always fun to read.

With Henson now out till May with an injury, it looks like Goron D’Arcy could become into form at just the right time and re-cement his partnership with O’Driscoll.

Shanklin or possibly Jamie Roberts should keep Maxi out of the reckoning at 13, but he may have more value as a utility back than Thom. Tindall is injured too, lest we forget.