When you pack down for a scrum, taking your bind on your team-mate’s shirt, lowering yourself down to begin preparations to put your body into one of the darkest, most uncomfortable places in professional sport, you need two things, apart from technical skill: belief and desire (Will Collier, the former England prop, writes).
Italy had that in spades as they dominated Scotland up front in their 18-15 victory in Rome last weekend — and by doing so they provided England with the blueprint to follow at Murrayfield on Saturday.
My main fear for Scotland before the Six Nations was that they would fall back on using the scrum only as a platform to play away from quickly, to feed their deadly back line. This mindset can lead to a passive scrum, which can quickly turn into a weak one.
• Read Will Collier’s analysis: ‘Italia’ call ended Scots’ scrum — aggressive Genge can lead another rout
Will conditions suit Scotland’s back line?
Having spent a number of years coming up to Edinburgh, more recently for Calcutta Cup games, I can’t remember it ever being this nice (Will Kelleher writes).
It is a clear wintery day in Edinburgh
TIM WILLIAMS/SHUTTERSTOCK
It’s always raining, but today it’s a beautiful, crisp, clear winter’s day. It’s freezing cold, and might snow later, but a wonderful day for some running rugby.
Does that suit Scotland, and their boy-band back line? England, you feel, will want to play a kick-pressure, squeezing game, and take advantage of sloppy moments on the counter, with their pace out wide. Maybe Steve Borthwick will pray for the sleet to come a bit sooner.
Not much optimism among Scots
We Scots are not always a bunch given to optimism, but even so, the lack of confidence among the home support arriving at the stadium has been striking to hear and feel (Mark Palmer writes).
The hope has to be that underdog status can help draw something, anything, from the group, who looked so bereft in Rome. Gregor Townsend and his team do have an enviable record in this fixture, but this is a different England team to those who have consistently come a cropper in recent editions of the Calcutta Cup, while Scotland themselves appear to be a side who are standing still, at best.
So quickly do the narratives and dynamics change in this great tournament, however, that this could all look somewhat different in a couple of hours’ time. Or not.
Townsend has had England’s number
Scotland’s capacity to raise their game for Calcutta Cup encounters is undeniable (Charlie Morgan writes). Having lost to England eight times in succession before 2018, they won five of the next seven meetings. That brought us to last year, when they should have ransacked Twickenham again.
Duhan van der Merwe races away during Scotland’s win at Murrayfield in 2024
INPHO
Three missed conversions from Finn Russell proved costly. Steve Borthwick’s charges edged through despite being outscored by three tries to one and looking at times like an anxious team with an inferiority complex.
Since the beginning of 2018, Scotland boast a 62.5 per cent win ratio against England. That figure is higher only against Italy (81.8 per cent) and Australia (66.6 per cent) among Six Nations and Rugby Championship opponents over the same period. Scotland have lost 11 from 11 against Ireland, for example, and five out of nine against Wales.
• Read Charlie Morgan’s analysis: Forget national pride — tactical nous is why Scotland keep beating England
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Enable cookiesAllow cookies onceIt was quite the ding-dong at Twickenham last year…Do England have confidence to set record straight?
In public, the instruction will have been for England to be humble, respectful and measured, but on the training field and in the team room over the past week, it should have been very different (Sam Warburton, the former Wales and Lions captain, writes). Behind closed doors, they should have been talking themselves up and stressing how Scotland simply should not be able to live with them on Saturday.
England have a bit of a mental hurdle to overcome with Scotland, not having won at Murrayfield since 2020 and having lost four of the past five encounters with them overall, before scraping home 16-15 at Twickenham last year. But now they have built up a convincing body of work that should inspire great confidence. They have won 12 Tests on the trot and thrashed Wales last weekend.
This is international sport. You must have that inner belief. The coaches do not want complacency, and they will still keep you on edge, but they want you to believe.
• Read Sam Warburton’s column: England should be telling themselves in private: we’ll batter Scotland
The teams have arrived at Murrayfield
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Enable cookiesAllow cookies onceDo Scotland have an England obsession?
If I was back in the England camp for the Calcutta Cup, my message to the lads would be to embrace the hostility: Scotland hate us and they always raise their game to play us — use that as fuel to throw back at them (Courtney Lawes writes). If I am going up against a team that only plays well because it’s England, well, that pisses me off.
Chris Robshaw, Ryan Wilson and Lawes get into a scuffle at Murrayfield in 2014 — a game England won 20-0
SHUTTERSTOCK
We know that this fixture matters more to Scotland than any other. The rivalry is historic. And I love it. But I have never understood Scotland’s mindset that a bad season can be saved by winning the Calcutta Cup. If Scotland played every week like they do against England, they would actually have a really good chance of winning the competition.
It strikes me as being a major weakness in the Scotland psyche. It holds them back. No wonder they never win anything. Scotland held the Calcutta Cup between 2021 and 2024 — but in each of those four Six Nations they never managed to finish higher than third in the championship.
• Read Courtney Lawes’s column: Scotland’s England obsession holds them back — no wonder they never win anything
The public mood towards Townsend has shifted and Franco Smith, right, is considered a successor-in-waiting
On the opening page of his autobiography, Gregor Townsend describes the crushing realisation as a player that he had extended his career for one season too many (John Westerby writes). He was 33 at the time, he had suffered recent injuries to his ankle, shoulder and neck, and was playing one last season, as a player-coach for Border Reivers in the Celtic League, having returned home after spells in France and South Africa.
In only the third game of the season, away to Ospreys, he played as poorly as he had ever done, his team were thumped 30-13 and he realised the game was up. He played until the end of the season, but felt he had risked outstaying his welcome. “A few months previously I’d announced publicly that I was going to retire at the end of the season,” he wrote. “It wasn’t the most positive of targets and for the first time in my career, I began to feel demotivated. Now, showing signs of being unable to reach the standards I had set for myself, I feared that I’d lose the respect of others, never mind my own self-respect.”
Motivation can become notoriously tricky once the end is in sight. As a passionately dedicated and hard-working Scotland head coach, there are no doubts that Townsend believes in his emotional commitment to the cause and in his desire to reach the “next level”, which has proved elusive during his nine years in the job. But after the abject defeat by Italy in Rome last weekend, on the back of an autumn of familiar frustrations, the doubts over Townsend’s ability to motivate his team are growing ever louder.
• Read John Westerby’s piece: Free spirit to micro-manager: has Townsend outstayed welcome?
Well, well, well. We have a potential upset on the cards in Dublin as Italy lead Ireland at half-time at the Aviva Stadium. Andy Farrell’s side started well, and with Italy down to 14 after Louis Lynagh was sent to the sin-bin for a deliberate knock-on, Jamie Osborne dived over for the first try. Sam Prendergast missed a routine conversion, so the lead remained only five.
Nicotera, centre, celebrates after giving Italy the lead
EVAN TREACY/GETTY
With 15 on the pitch, Italy have been dominant. They have been crushing Ireland at scrum time, and with Craig Casey in the bin for a head-on-head collision with Lorenzo Cannone, Giacomo Nicotera peeled off the back of an Italy maul to put the visiting team ahead.
A penny for your thoughts, Mr Farrell.
England dominate fixture… but not in recent yearsWill Borthwick’s side show us the ‘England way’?
England have a chip on their shoulder (Alex Lowe writes). Pinned to a cuttings board at their training headquarters is every quote and every article to have suggested that the opposition “failed to turn up” or “were not at their best” as England compiled 12 consecutive victories. It is a narrative that annoys Steve Borthwick. He believes it denies his men due credit for shutting teams down and imposing upon them the “England way”.
Borthwick believes his side have not received due credit for their run of 12 consecutive wins
ANDY BUCHANAN/AFP/GETTY
A prime example would be from the birth of this winning run — England’s best sequence of results since 2016-17 — against France in round two of last year’s Six Nations. England grabbed a dramatic victory with a converted try from Elliot Daly after France had butchered three potential tries. French profligacy was the consistent take. England’s view was that the pressure applied by their scramble defence had forced those errors, and that they had made France play badly.
Borthwick has a point. Australia and New Zealand failed to fire a shot in their defeats by England in November at Twickenham. Argentina were trailing 17-3 before deciding to go down all guns blazing. Last week, poor hapless Wales crumbled with barely a whimper under the weight of the England way. There is a trend. Even when England were losing tight games through 2024, they were a hard team to put away.
• Read Alex Lowe’s piece: England make elite look bad — and they want credit for it
And Scotland’s line-up for you…
T Jordan; K Steyn, H Jones, S Tuipulotu (capt), J Dobie; F Russell, B White; N McBeth, G Turner, Z Fagerson, G Brown, S Cummings, J Ritchie, R Darge, J Dempsey.
Replacements D Cherry, P Schoeman, E Millar Mills, M Williamson, M Fagerson, G Horne, A Hastings, D Graham.
Good afternoon and welcome to The Times’ coverage of the 132nd Calcutta Cup. England travel to face Scotland at Murrayfield, where they have not won since 2020, on a streak of 12 consecutive victories and can follow up their impressive demolition of Wales in the first round of the Six Nations last Saturday.
Scotland, on the other hand, desperately need a win after their defeat by Italy last weekend. Gregor Townsend, their head coach, is under significant pressure, but his record against England is impressive. His side have won five and drawn one of the past eight meetings between these sides.
Our reporters will be bringing you updates and analysis from Edinburgh, so follow along and enjoy as the action unfolds.