Feeling a bit disenchanted and even slightly neglected, Dougie Fife took the course of action that would be recommended to many young men in their mid-20s and went travelling.

In his case, however, it was almost a busman’s holiday as he joined the Scotland sevens squad on their globetrotting adventures.

“To be honest I don’t think I was enjoying my rugby as much,” he admitted, as he reflected on his departure from Edinburgh at the end of the 2015/16 season.

“The way we were playing was just really quite boring at times for a winger and it was getting me down. We weren’t winning many games and then when I got released to sevens it just felt like a new life almost.

“A lot of it is coaches as well. Some people just don’t fit in the coach’s mould and Solly [former Edinburgh head coach Alan Solomons] just lost interest in me it seemed and other guys were coming through. Edinburgh had a team that never really got changed and to be fair the boys that were playing my position were doing really well and they didn’t need me at the time, so I went to play sevens and loved it.”

It was just what he needed to rediscover a love for his sport and he credits former Scotland sevens coach Calum ‘Kitty’ MacRae with helping that could happen.

“Kitty was a big part of it,” he said. “He really pushed me and and everything seemed to click again and we obviously did really well at some tournaments. I think it just sparked me up a lot... got me back on my feet again where I am.”

As this season began, then, he was very happy to continue playing sevens, noting that:“There was a big year coming up with the Commonwealth Games and the World Cup, so XVs was never really on my horizon.”

It seems no coincidence, however, that MacRae’s recruitment to the Edinburgh backroom staff was followed by an invitation to some of those he had cultivated to join him.

“Sevens started a bit later than XVs so we were about to start our first week and John Dalziel [Scotland’s new sevens coach] said Edinburgh wanted to have a few of us in,” Fife said.

“It was only supposed to be a two-week trip because they had a trip to St Andrews and they would have a look at me there. That moved on to a month, then it kept going another couple of months, then the first tournament came round and we got offered contracts and I was really enjoying my rugby again. 

“I’m not sure whether Kitty said to Richard [Cockerill, Edinburgh’s head coach] to look at me or Richard’s brought me in, but being close to Kitty for a year, we know how he works and he’s pretty full-on. He’s rugby, rugby 100 per cent of the day, so we know what he’s like and we knew he’d bring a lot to the club, which he has. He probably was a big factor in it.”

MacRae has helped bring new energy to the set-up, Fife observing that: “The way we’re playing now is a lot more exciting. They’re giving us a lot more freedom.”

He believes, too, that he has returned to the confines of the 15-a-side game a better player thanks to having to deal with the wide-open expanses available in sevens.

“It’s pretty horrible on a sevens pitch, playing against Kiwis, Fijians and having 20 metres each side of you,” he noted. “Your defence improves, your attacking ability… 

I was playing centre as well so there was a lot of decision making and passing and it put a lot more pressure on my skills which has helped me.”

However, focused as he is on helping Edinburgh enhance their PRO14 play-off prospects in Ulster tomorrow with a European Challenge Cup quarter-final to come, he still has a hankering to end the season back in sevens action at the Commonwealth Games.

“Quite a lot of XVs guys have been told they’re in the running, so I don’t know how big that pool is or who’s in or what. I think there’s a lot of us, but I would love to do it,” he said.

Either way, though, he is happy at his work once more and, with Edinburgh announcing yesterday that Blair Kinghorn (three years), Damien Hoyland (two years) and Duhan van der Merwe (one year) have all signed new deals, Fife’s demeanour is a further demonstration of the importance of creating an environment that players want to be involved in.

“I’m really liking it, enjoying it. I’ve seen a big change. Once you’ve been out of the fold for a bit travelling the world with the sevens, coming back to Edinburgh there’s definitely a big change,” said Fife.