Neither forward has so far seen action in this year’s Six Nations Championship, but their heft should come in useful as Edinburgh seek the victory they need to get back anywhere close to contention for a place in the play-offs. The same could be said of the three players who are available again after injury.

“Marshall Sykes is returning back from injury and we’ve got Dylan Richardson and Mosese Tuipulotu,” Everitt confirmed. “So we’re getting numbers back, which is great for us, because we were left a little bit thin.”

Liam McConnell is among those players whose recovery is not yet complete, but Everitt is confident that the Scotland back-row will be fit to return at some point in the next few weeks. “Liam’s still recovering from a rib fracture,” he said. “We’re hoping that he’ll be ready for the South African tour [in late March], or the Ulster game [on 13 March] – that would be the perfect scenario so that he can get game time before we get on the flight to South Africa. He’s recovering really well. For him it’s just about time.”

Meanwhile, the coach confirmed that stand-off Ben Healy will leave the Hive at the end of the season, although he admitted he was unsure how close to completion the 26-year-old’s reported move to La Rochelle was. “Ben’s contract was up at the end of the season and he had been told that [it would not be renewed],” the coach said.

“He’s got every right to look for a new club and La Rochelle is certainly a good club for him to go to. Hopefully it works out well for him.”

Healy, a former Ireland Under-20 international, joined Edinburgh from Munster in the summer of 2023, having made his Scotland debut earlier that year. He started in all 23 games in his first season with the club, impressing as a composed, intelligent playmaker and scoring 218 points. But a knee injury then disrupted his progress, and, although he signed a one-year contract extension last April, he has since failed to re-establish himself as a regular in Everitt’s squad, with Cammy Scott and Ross Thompson both being preferred at times.

Edinburgh confirmed earlier this month that assistant coaches Rob Chrystie and Michael Todd will leave at the end of the season, while last week it was announced that another assistant, Scott Mathie, will also leave in the summer. The departure of Chrystie and Todd is part of a planned reshuffle, but Everitt had hoped that his fellow-South-African Mathie would stay along with forwards coach Stevie Lawrie. 

“I think while we were discussing and negotiating contracts an opportunity came up for him to go to the Sharks,” he explained. “It was quite sudden from them as well, with their change of head coach. “It was just coincidence. And with his kids ready to go to school, they felt it was a good family decision to go back to Durban.

“It’s part of the evolution of the club,” he continued when asked about the coaching changes as a whole. “We looked back over time and particularly we want to look forward. We felt that there was a need for change. It’s structural change as well.

“Sometimes it’s good to freshen up the workplace with new voices and new ideas. The coaches that have worked here have worked extremely hard. They’re good men, they’re good family men. But unfortunately in sports sometimes you do need change. 

“That’s where we are at the club at the moment as we evolve. We want to evolve our staff as well.

“We’re going to look at the candidates that come in. Obviously there’s been a lot of interest in these positions. We’re going to structure around the strongest individuals that we can get.”

Asked how close Edinburgh were to making appointments, Everitt said: “We have shortlisted coaches. We’ll probably know in a month.”

Former Scotland captain Greig Laidlaw, currently an assistant coach with the national under-20s side, has been consistently linked with Edinburgh, the theory being that a job with the capital club would be a stepping stone to the ex-scrum-half’s eventual accession to the Scotland job once Gregor Townsend departs as national head coach. “He’s one of many names,” Everitt said. 

“There’s been interest all around the world in these positions. We’re very, very lucky in that respect that the club is of interest to so many reputable coaches. It’s exciting.”