IT'S typical of Ruaridh Jackson's luck this season that when Scotland pulled off their historic win in Australia last weekend, he was the only replacement not called off the bench to help shore up the defences in the final minutes.
Worse, it looked as though the main reason was not any doubt about his competence but that so many of the players who had been on from the start were suffering, nobody could quite work out who most needed to come off.
"I thought at one stage I was going to come on for [John] Barclay [the flanker]," he recalled. "It was a shame not to get on the pitch but still awesome to be part of the win over there. The boys were outstanding.
"The bench was not a bad place to view it from; definitely the most animated I have ever been, especially the last 10 minutes when there were a lot of highs and lows. I was desperate for Australia not to do to us again what they have done the last couple of times [come from behind to win]. That turnover at the end was a very sweet moment."
The other piece of great news for Jackson came when it was announced that Finn Russell was off to join the British & Irish Lions. Not only was it a deserved promotion for a colleague he clearly admires, but it opened the door for him to dare to hope of a proper role in the tour finale, when they play Fiji in Suva.
Coming at the end of a season where he struggled with a series of injuries early on and then found his route to playing fly half at Harlequins, his club, blocked by Nick Evans, the former All Black, he is just hoping his luck has turned.
"We want to go out on a high," Jackson insisted. "It will be the last game for a couple of months, the game you are going to remember – so you want to win it. We also want to cap off a great tour. Coming away and getting three from three would be a great start for Gregor [Townsend as head coach] and the other guys involved."
Jackson is in almost unique position when it comes to playing Fiji. When Niko Matawalu, the Islanders' key playmaker at scrum half, arrived at Glasgow Warriors, Jackson was as often as not the fly half trying to nurse his mercurial colleague through games.
Not that it was easy. Even as teammates Matawalu was full of surprises. "You had set plays to go to and the next thing, he was off trying to run round 10 guys and throw in a crazy offload. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. That was all part of the magic, I guess," Jackson recalled.
"Even playing with him it is tough to read him and know what he is going to do. We can try to pressure him and try to force him into mistakes but he has that ability to make something happen. We are wary of him. It helps a little that we know him, but he is so out there at times, is hard to read."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here