What Gregor Townsend said to Scotland's Six Nations title-chasers ahead of trip to Ireland

The Scots go into the final weekend of the championship with the chance to win major silverware for the first time in 27 years.

Whoever prevails at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday afternoon will lift the Triple Crown, an honour Scotland have not won since the Grand Slam campaign of 1990. However, the bigger prize is the Six Nations title itself and Scotland, Ireland and France all go into the final day with designs on glory.

France and Scotland are joint top of the standings on 16 points, with Ireland on 14. The French, who host England in Paris on Saturday night, are in the box seat because they have the best points difference (+79), with Scotland on +21 and Ireland +16.

Myriad outcomes are possible but, put simply, Scotland can become champions for the first time since 1999 if they win with a bonus point and France do not.

Shielding the players

“We know it ends at the weekend,” said Townsend. “The team's not going to be the same in the summer. There's going to be changes, there's going to be people injured. They've all got different focuses after this weekend, so just one more opportunity, and what's been a great few weeks, just to end it on a real high.”

Momentum has built throughout the campaign as Scotland recovered from a dreadful loss to Italy in their opening game to beat England, Wales and France. The coach has kept the build-up to the Ireland match as normal as possible and seemed keen to shield his players from expectations and the weight of history as he addressed the media in Edinburgh before flying to Dublin.

Asked about their chances of winning the title, Townsend said: “We've not talked about that. It's really another opportunity to play, the final opportunity for this group to go out and play. You can see that they're loving playing together. We see it in training, the togetherness in the group, and this is just our final chance to do that before they go back to their clubs.”

Townsend said he had no plans to crank up the emotion ahead of Saturday’s game at the Aviva Stadium nor had he brought in any motivational speakers to address the squad. He rated last weekend’s stunning 50-40 win over France as one of the best Scotland performances of all time but said the players kept a lid on the celebrations, knowing what lay ahead.

The players went straight home

“I think this group are aware of what's at stake but they're very calm around the game right now,” said Townsend. “I've seen it in training. I saw it in how we reacted after the win at the weekend.

“Most guys went home that night knowing that there was a big week of training up ahead. We know we've got one more week together, one more week of training. It's important that we train hard, which they have done. They're enjoying playing for Scotland.”

Townsend has made three changes for the game in Dublin, two of them enforced. Max Williamson and Grant Gilchrist step into the second-row vacancies created by injuries to Scott Cummings and Gregor Brown. In the front row, Zander Fagerson returns to the starting XV, with D’arcy Rae moving to the bench.

Ireland have won this fixture 11 times in a row. The Scots have not beaten them since 2017 and not won in Dublin since 2010. The coach acknowledged it would take something special to change the narrative.

“For me, this was the toughest game of the season when we saw the draw,” said Townsend. “Ireland with their record at home, their record over us, they're always in the top three in the world. So it's going to require our best performance to win, our best performance in the championship so far.”

Scotland team to play Ireland

Scotland: 15 Blair Kinghorn; 14 Darcy Graham, 13 Huw Jones, 12 Sione Tuipulotu (capt), 11 Kyle Steyn; 10 Finn Russell, 9 Ben White; 1 Pierre Schoeman, 2 George Turner, 3 Zander Fagerson, 4 Max Williamson, 5 Grant Gilchrist, 6 Matt Fagerson, 7 Rory Darge, 8 Jack Dempsey. Replacements: 16 Ewan Ashman, 17 Rory Sutherland, 18 D’arcy Rae, 19 Alex Craig, 20 Magnus Bradbury, 21, George Horne, 22 Kyle Rowe, 23 Tom Jordan.

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