Gregor Townsend backs Scotland to learn from ‘painful experiences’ of last year

By Anthony Brown, PA

Gregor Townsend believes the “painful experiences” that undermined Scotland’s last tilt at the Guinness Six Nations have made them a stronger proposition ahead of this year’s championship.

After winning their opening two matches of 2024 against Wales and England, the Scots ended up finishing fourth after a controversial home defeat at home to France and a shock loss away to Italy before they rounded their campaign with a narrow defeat by champions Ireland in Dublin.

Townsend saw enough in the autumn series to feel that the impact of the near miss against France – when Sam Skinner’s last-gasp try was contentiously not awarded by the officials – and the second-half collapse in Rome has helped move his experienced squad forward with renewed focus.

“You want to win every game, that’s why we put the work in, but you often get better with painful experiences,” said the head coach, who named his 37-man squad on Wednesday. “I feel we’re a better team now from the pain we went through in the France game and the Italy game in particular.

“We were a better team against Ireland, it was different in the summer tour because there were younger players coming into the group, but I feel the team’s moved on since last year’s Six Nations and they showed that in the South Africa game (a 32-15 defeat) in particular and in parts of the Australia game (a 27-13 win).

“So yeah, losing and the pain of losing can make you better but that’s not what we’re working towards, we’re working towards getting as many wins as possible.”

Having won three of their four autumn tests and produced a spirited display against the Boks in the other one, Townsend is optimistic about how Scotland – who kick off the championship with back-to-back home games against Italy and Ireland – are shaping up.

“We love the group we’ve got, we feel they’re driving more and more of our standards, our game, our training and we just want to build on what we did in November and add an extra layer,” he said.

“You hope that you get luck with injuries that you don’t get affected throughout the championship because that will be a factor but I feel this team has had shared experiences together, they know what Six Nations is all about, the preparation that’s required, the games and how to win back momentum within games so, yeah, we’re in a good place.

“We just have to make sure we attack the next two weeks when we’re in camp and that first game with everything we’ve got.”

Townsend is anticipating a “fascinating” championship with several tightly contested matches decided by fine margins.

“You saw that in last year’s competition, there was close wins, close defeats,” he said. “There were victories for Italy and you look at the depth that some countries have, it’s impressive.

“Some countries might not have the same depth or they have injury concerns, but the starting XVs of all six countries are going to be strong and home advantage, momentum, luck with injuries and bounce of the ball could decide results. I think it’s a fascinating tournament.

“Ireland are the reigning champions, France had a really good November, other teams are competing to do better and do well in this year’s championship, so we know it’s going to be five very tough fixtures for us against quality sides.”