ALL through all the discussions about concussion in rugby, one of the continuing battles has been to make sure players do not hide symptoms. Mike Blair, now the Scotland skills coach, has revealed how far there is to go by admitting that when he got the knock that eventually ended his career, his first instinct was to say nothing.

After trying to come back from an extended lay-off with concussion symptoms, he let a whole week lapse before he accepted the inevitable and told his coach and the club medical staff the headaches had come back after a bang in his comeback game.

Though he got the knock in the first half of that match, he forced himself to play on – a professional player's first instinct is always to play.

"It was one of those horrible moments when I thought, ‘if I say something now that’s potentially me done; I probably would not play again'. So I kind of kept quiet about it," he admitted.

"I thought I would see how things went, and if the headaches went away I wouldn’t have to say anything about it.

"I still had headaches after a week. Then I thought, ‘what am I doing here? I’ve just turned 35'. I decided that it was the time to say something. Gregor [Townsend, then his head coach at Glasgow Warriors] said we would see how things went, but I had pretty much decided that we wouldn’t go messing about with the head."

In Blair's case the final decision was easy. He had got the original bang on the head playing the Scarlets in December and had been out for two months because the headaches kept coming back. He already knew he was in his last season and had a reasonable idea of what the future would hold.

Yet Blair, who moved seamlessly from playing to coaching, still took his time owning up to the severity of the problem. If somebody with his intelligence and experience left it that late, you can only wonder how the younger players are reacting if they are affected in the same way.

The beginning of the end had the consolation of opening a door to a new and different existence as a coach, a role he had been easing his way into for some time before the head injury made the transition inevitable.

As a skills coach at both the club and with Scotland, he has the task of trying to make sure the players are capable of delivering the fast game Townsend demanded at Glasgow and is now demanding with Scotland. Blair will head back to Glasgow after this tour and is expecting Dave Rennie, the new head coach, to want more of the same.

"My speciality, I guess, is specifically the nines, but that is a small part of the job – I help with the forwards on the handling side of things," he said. "We try to use our forwards a lot more as playmakers, decision makers.

"It is a brilliant position for me to be as a young coach. Having the coaching team I have here to learn from, I am finding better ways of doing things.

"My job description is 'skills coach' but basically where I am needed I will go – at this level a lot of players know what they want and what they need to improve. A lot of that means just being around at training, me suggesting 'do you want to do a little bit of this?' them saying 'I want to do a little bit of that'."

It is a natural fit for Blair, who was always one of the most analytical players around and he moved into it quickly and easily, the most obvious benefit to Scottish rugby being the sudden arrival of of Ali Price as an international.

"He is a really talented player, which makes what I do a lot easier," Blair said. "He has made big progress. He played only five or six games in my last playing season but he has been involved a lot this season. He has started some really big games.

"Ali has improved a lot, but he has always had it in him. There might be bits-and-bobs that I point out, but he is a smart player and will work things out for himself.

"He is a confident guy. The more you get used to an environment, the more you can set the tempo of a game. That’s an important part of our game, knowing when to do things. There are times you have to slow things down and control a game."

With Greig Laidlaw aiming to play on after his summer move to France; Price, Henry Pyrgos and Sean Kennedy on this tour and Sam Hidalgo-Clyne missing it through injury, Blair believes he has plenty of scrum half talent to work with in the future, even without looking at the generation coming through from junior and age-grade ranks.

"Coaching-wise, I wanted to work with the best players and I was fortunate to be given that opportunity," he said. "The role I have means I don’t have to tell people they have been dropped. I am there to help everyone as best I can.

"I did wonder at the start whether it would be awkward but I have not really felt that. As an older player I felt I was moving into that role anyway."

So that bang on the head worked out just fine for him in the long-run. It did not stop him keeping quiet about for a week, though. There is a lesson for all players in that.