Townsend ready to seize Scotland chance

Scotland veteran Gregor Townsend insists he is not worried about being being third choice fly-half for his country and is just happy to be in the side.

The Borders player started on the bench against Ireland and played at centre against France but will eventually turn out in his favourite stand-off position against Wales.

Gordon Ross and Brendan Laney have been tried and discarded and Townsend will be the third number 10 Ian McGeechan has used in three games as the Scottish coach searches desperately for his first RBS 6 Nations Championship win this season.

Townsend said: “I’m really happy to be in the team and I’m not concerned about being moved around as long as I’m in the 15.

“I had ambitions to be playing at 10 and it was frustrating sitting on the bench against Ireland.

“At that point I didn’t think I would be back in the team at number 10 two games later, especially when they used another centre the week after against France.

“Stand-off is my favourite position and of the 11 years that I’ve played club rugby, only three of them have been played elsewhere.

“But the coach obviously went with the team that he thought would win the first two games and I wasn’t part of that.

“And it’s only natural that if you lose two games then there are going to be some changes.

“Fortunately for me I’m back in but if me and the other guys who have come in don’t take our chances, the there’s some good players who will step in to replace us.

“You have to play well to keep your position and that’s what I have to do now if I want to play in the rest of the games.”

After losing heavily against Ireland and France, the Scots are under pressure to get some points on the board against Wales before they face up to the might of England.

Townsend admitted victory was crucial against the Welsh and conceded the Scots must start the game better than they have in the previous two games if they are to grab that elusive victory.

He said: “It’s a must win game for us but when you get to match three in the championship most games are.

“Wales will be saying it’s a must win game because they lost to Italy but it’s a home game for us and we’d hope to beat them at Murrayfield.

“We don’t want to go to the England game with no wins out of three so we need to win this game and it’s very important that we get off to a good start and get some points on the board.

“We’ve tried to play catch-up rugby in the last 20 minutes of our first two games and we ended up giving away tries.

“And that’s maybe one reason the scores have been so big so we don’t want to be doing that again.”

Tomorrow’s match will set a new record for ticket sales for a Scotland international. With a capacity crowd of 67,500 expected, the £2.15m generated will surpasses the £2.1m revenue from the match against Ireland last month.