Townsend shakes up Scotland squad as trio called up, two more out injured and 67 cap star dropped

Scotland are facing up to the loss of two players for Saturday’s Six Nations clash with Wales and two other members of Gregor Townsend’s squad have now returned to their club sides.

It has been a challenging campaign for Townsend and his players so far after they failed to build on a promising start to this year’s competition with a 31-19 home win against a dangerous Italy side. A 32-18 home loss against Ireland followed eight days later before they suffered an agonising 16-15 defeat against England as their bid to retain the Calcutta Cup for a fifth consecutive year fell narrowly short.

All eyes now turn towards this weekend’s home clash with a Wales side who will be under the interim charge of Matt Sherratt for the second game after they parted ways with Warren Gatland after last month’s 22-15 defeat against Italy. There will be some big calls for Townsend to make when he names his starting 15 for the - but he will be without the services of four players after the latest injury updates were released on Monday.

A statement on the Scottish Rugby website read: “Luke Crosbie and Jack Mann have been ruled out due to injury. Crosbie was replaced early on in the Edinburgh game on Friday night and has returned to his club to undergo further assessment. Jack Mann picked up a head injury on Friday night and is undergoing World Rugby’s concussion protocols. Ali Price and Ross McCann have returned to Edinburgh Rugby.”

However, there was good news for two of Edinburgh Rugby’s heroes from their remarkable 34-28 win at Munster on Friday night as hat-trick scorer Matt Currie is recalled alongside team-mate Ben Muncaster. Prop Nathan McBeth is also handed a recall after the Glasgow Warriors star scored a try in their defeat against Ospreys/

Who is in the current Scotland Six Nations squad?

Forwards

Ewan Ashman – Edinburgh Rugby, Jamie Bhatti – Glasgow Warriors, Gregor Brown – Glasgow Warriors, Dave Cherry – Edinburgh Rugby, Rory Darge – Glasgow Warriors, Jack Dempsey – Glasgow Warriors, Matt Fagerson – Glasgow Warriors, Zander Fagerson – Glasgow Warriors, Euan Ferrie – Glasgow Warriors, Grant Gilchrist – Edinburgh Rugby, Jonny Gray – Bordeaux Bègles, Patrick Harrison – Edinburgh Rugby, Cameron Henderson – Leicester, Will Hurd – Leicester Tigers, Ewan Johnson – Oyonnax, Nathan McBeth – Glasgow Warriors, Ben Muncaster – Edinburgh Rugby, D’Arcy Rae – Edinburgh Rugby, Jamie Ritchie – Edinburgh Rugby, Pierre Schoeman – Edinburgh Rugby, Sam Skinner – Edinburgh Rugby, Rory Sutherland – Glasgow Warriors, Marshall Sykes – Edinburgh Rugby

Backs

Fergus Burke – Saracens, Matt Currie – Edinburgh Rugby, Jamie Dobie – Glasgow Warriors, Darcy Graham – Edinburgh Rugby, George Horne – Glasgow Warriors, Rory Hutchinson – Northampton Saints, Huw Jones – Glasgow Warriors, Tom Jordan – Glasgow Warriors, Blair Kinghorn – Toulouse, Stafford McDowall – Glasgow Warriors, Cameron Redpath – Bath Rugby, Arron Reed – Sale Sharks, Finn Russell – Bath Rugby, Kyle Rowe – Glasgow Warriors, Ollie Smith – Glasgow Warriors, Duhan van der Merwe – Edinburgh Rugby, Ben White – Toulon

Scotland vs Wales date and kick off time for Six Nations clash

Scotland vs Wales will take place at Scottish Gas Murrayfield this Saturday, March 8 with a 4:45pm kick off. It is the second of three Round 4 matches in this year’s competition with Ireland hosting France in the opener earlier on Saturday and Italy heading to Twickenham to face England on Sunday.

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