Scotland 18-32 Ireland: Coaches made call to not play Russell after HIA pass as Graham hospitalised

It was another disappointing result for Scotland against Ireland as they went down 32-18 at Murrayfield in a match where they had to make early changes to their back line following a nasty collision between Finn Russell and Darcy Graham.

The freak accident saw the two players clash heads with Graham coming off worse, seemingly knocked unconscious and having to be taken to hospital. Russell went off for a Head Injury Assessment (HIA) which he actually passed but after a conversation with assistant coach Peter Horne the Scotland staff made the call not to bring him back on the pitch.

Speaking after the match, head coach Gregor Townsend explained: “He (Darcy Graham) was still waiting to go for scans was the latest I heard. I believe there is no issues around his neck and it’s more just seeing what the concussion has come from and hoping there are no broken bones in his face or skull area.

“Finn passed his HIA. It was more the communication that Peter Horne and a couple other guys on the sideline were having with him and we decided he’s not right. There were a couple of thing he wasn’t remembering about plays so we made the call not to put him back on.”

The forced change saw Jamie Dobie brought on for Graham in a straight swap on the wing while Stafford McDowall replaced Russell with Tom Jordan moving from 12 to stand off.

“He (Russell) is obviously frustrated. It’s a freak injury, you collide into your own player which has happened to him once before colliding with Zander (Fagerson) in a game for Glasgow against Connacht many years ago. It’s a huge blow for both those players, two key players for us to be out.

“We went six-two on the bench and as luck would have it you lose two backs early on in the game. I have to say the two players that came on, Stafford and Jamie, played really well and I think Tom played really well at 10. You’re asking them to come on at 10-0 down when you’re having to play a lot better as a team and you have to drive that up against one of the top teams in the world. They’ll have gotten a lot out of that, those three players that had to play in different positions.”

Away from the injury issues it was a familiar story for Scotland and Townsend who found themselves 17-0 down inside the first 30 minutes. They managed to claw their way back into the game in a 20 minute purple patch, ten minutes either side of half time, but the Irish quickly wrestled back control and won the contest comfortably in the end.

Ireland have now won this fixture 11 times in a row and Townsend, as head coach, has never beaten the men in green. Focusing on this game individually, he believes a few individual errors and Ireland’s overall quality as a side was what won it on the day.”

“Obviously they’ve beaten us again and they’re a quality side, we didn’t play well enough today. We made a few errors in that first 20 minutes that put us under unnecessary pressure but the middle period was what put us back into the game. We just didn’t do enough to get ahead on the scoreboard.”