Key Scotland man facing race to be fit for Autumn Tests - but better news on clubmate

Franco Smith, the Glasgow head coach, estimated that the back-row forward would be out for four to six weeks as he recovers from medical collateral ligament (MCL) damage.

Scotland will face the All Blacks in Edinburgh on November 8, five weeks on Saturday. It is the second of four matches the national team will play at Murrayfield next month. They open against the USA on November 1 and also take on Argentina and Tonga, on November 16 and 23.

Darge, who skippered Scotland on their summer Pacific tour and was co-captain with Finn Russell during last season’s Six Nations, has been sidelined by a serious knee injury in the past but Glasgow coach Franco Smith played down the seriousness of this latest setback.

“He's going to have a four to six week recovery time on his injury,” said Smith. “It's MCL, so it's not that serious around his knee. If you want to hurt your knee, I suppose that's the best one [ligament] to hurt. So we will see.

“I'm sure they'll work hard to get him ready for the autumn series. So I'm sure that he's going to recover for some or most of it.”

He's a tough and resilient player

Asked if the injury would rule the flanker out of the New Zealand game, Smith said: “No, definitely not. I think once the soreness is away, then usually with those injuries you can push on. I've played my whole rugby career without any of those ligaments. And, yeah, as soon as you get the proprioception back and the strengthening and the soreness is away, then they usually can go.

“And that depends from person to person. He's quite a tough and resilient player. So for now, you shouldn't rule out anything.”

Darge will miss Glasgow’s next four matches, starting with Saturday’s game against Benetton in the United Rugby Championship. The Warriors will also be without Jack Dempsey for the game in Italy and possibly longer. The No 8 pulled up during the warm-up for the Sharks game due to a groin issue.

“With Jack, fortunately, it's not going to be as serious as I thought originally. So that's good news,” said Smith. “Hopefully we can see him before the autumn Test matches.”

Return of popular duo

Smith has made seven changes for the game in Treviso and the headline news for Warriors supporters is the return of Sione Tuipulotu and Kyle Steyn.

It will be Tuipulotu’s first outing since he scored the first British and Irish Lions Test try of the tour of Australia. A hamstring injury caused the centre to miss the second and third Tests as the tourists won the series 2-1.

For Steyn, it is his first game since fracturing his hand playing for Scotland against Samoa on the summer tour, and he will lead Glasgow out against Benetton.

“I'm very excited for both of them, I think they are eager to contribute,” said Smith. “Sione has hardly been involved with us in the last six months [due to a pectoral injury]. I could see the excitement this week from his perspective. Obviously, he wants to get a bit of continuity going into the Autumn Nations period. We know how important that is. But obviously, his contribution here is massively important. So he's very excited.

“The same with Kyle. Kyle obviously wanted to lead the team out last week. He was touch and go then. But, yeah, he's excited to contribute as well now and lead from the front. So good to have some influential people coming into the group.”

Half-back changes

Tuipulotu replaces Kerr Yule in the centre and Ollie Smith drops out to make way for Steyn on the wing. Smith has also switched his half-backs, with Jamie Dobie and Adam Hastings taking over from George Horne and Dan Lancaster who are both on the bench.

There are three changes in the pack; Rory Sutherland comes in for Jamie Bhatti at loosehead prop and flankers Gregor Brown and Macenzzie Duncan take the places of Euan Ferrie and Darge.

Glasgow suffered their heaviest defeat of the URC season against Benetton in Treviso in May, going down 33-7. Smith called the result an "outlier".

“Sometimes you get these outlier performances. Sometimes you play extraordinarily well, sometimes you have an extraordinary off day.

“That was a day where I thought they [Benetton] played very well, but we were off it. I think there were a lot of things happening with the Lions being announced that week. We had already qualified [for the URC play-offs] two games before that. We were already talking about home quarters and home semi-finals, which is normal for a team that's excited about defending their challenge.

“So maybe we took our eye off the ball that day and I will not make an excuse for it.”