JAMIE DEMPSEY, the Glasgow Hawks head coach, has been handed the responsibility of looking after the development of some of the country's best young players after being appointed manager of the BT Sport Scottish Rugby Academy for Glasgow and the West of Scotland.
Dempsey, a lecturer in sports coaching at New College, Lanarkshire, is expected to step into his new role at the beginning of next month. Stephen Gemmell, the Scottish Rugby Union head of academy and perfomance programmes, has also confirmed that 51-year-old Australian Bruce Frame is to head up the SRU Academy in the Caledonia region.
Managers of the equivalent academies in Edinburgh and the Borders have yet to be appointed, but Gemmell suggested that those posts would be filled in the near future.
Dempsey has been head coach at the Hawks for the past two years. Previously, he was an assistant coach with the Anniesland club and has also worked with the Scotland under-16 side and Scotland women.
The establishment of a new academy structure is a cornerstone of the SRU's most recent development plan, and Dempsey explained that he was looking forward to getting on with his new job. "It will be the cornerstone to producing world-class Scottish talent in the west," he said. "I want to try to build on the strong professional culture at Glasgow Warriors and replicate the core values in the Glasgow rugby community.
"I also want to see our players drive forward in the academy at national level and create a rugby development programme that is not just equal to, but better than everything else on offer. To begin with my team and I will assess the strengths and the needs of the current good work that is going on nationwide and in Glasgow and the west and start to bring together a clear strategy that puts in place the goals of the academies.
"I foresee the long-term success of this role being seen by an improvement in the quality of players that graduate into the pro game and ultimately in the standings of our international age-grade teams. I'm really looking forward to getting stuck into it."
Frame, an ex-team-mate of Michael Lynagh in the Australia under-17 side of the early 1980s, comes to Scotland from his current position as development manager with the Australian Rugby Union in the northern part of New South Wales.
Meanwhile, Glasgow Warriors have announced that the capacity of their Scotstoun ground has been raised to close to 7000 with the erection of a covered stand at the west end of the ground. Its first use will be at the European Rugby Champions Cup clash with Bath on October 18.
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