Scotland scrum half Ali Price admitted his heart was in his mouth worrying about the Lions prospects of teammate Zander Fagerson as the TV slo-mo’s created a red card shaped sword of Damocles on the big screen above his head.
The tighthead may yet have a nervous few hours waiting for the citing report deadline to pass, after his outstretched arm made contact with the head of Dragons scrum half Gonzalo Bertranou.
The arm was out for protection, rather than to strike, but with the combination of the current climate punishing any high contact, a previous red card against Wales and the exaggerated effect of slow motion replays, fellow Lions squad member Price understood better than anyone what was at stake.
It also brought home the tricky balancing act between needing rugby action to keep sharp and challenge for Lions starting sports, against the risk of injury or – in this case – a possible red card ending tour hopes.
So while Glasgow still have a chance of reaching the Rainbow Cup final if they beat Leinster this weekend, it may be that their Lions pair have played their last game before joining the Lions training camp.
"Yeah, I’ll be honest, I was worried,” admitted Price when asked after the game about the Fagerson replays.
“When you watch those kind of incidents these days, when they slow things down and look at the point of contact … I was starting to get worried for him.
‘I know he’s had a red card earlier in the season and they take that into account. I didn’t speak to him on the field when they were making the decision, but I was very aware of it. But it was just a penalty, so it’s all good.
“You’ve just got to focus and play your game. A lot of guys speak about it in terms of trying to avoid injury and all the rest of it.
“That’s when you’ll get yourself in trouble, if you are half-hearted about things. Rugby’s rugby, isn’t it?
‘You’ve just got to go out and perform as best you can. My focus is the next match I'm playing. I'm not in South Africa yet and not in camp with the Lions. I’ve still got to do my job.”
Price and Fagerson had spent part of this week meeting up with their Lions colleagues, helping to bring home the nature of the imminent tour.
“We had a couple of admin days in London during the week and that was the first chance to meet everyone and get some stuff out the way, which was great,” he said.
“Everyone knows of each other but the difference over the next couple of months is that you make bonds with these guys on a personal level.
“Going from the first couple of days it looks like the squad is going to be pretty tight. Everyone is very welcoming and excited to get started.”
The bonus point win was secured with a try in the final minute which was referred to the TMO after Glasgow had already had three tries chalked off after being awarded on the pitch.
One was the Fagerson incident which resulted in a penalty, one was the smallest of knock-ons picked up by the Dragons players and challenged by their captain, one was adjudged to be obstruction even though the ‘blocked’ player was able to tackle his man.
Both coaches, Danny Wilson of Glasgow and Dean Ryan of the Dragons, were unhappy with the way the captain’s challenge slowed the game down even if the final decisions were technically correct.
Wilson was delighted with the way his players fronted up in this game with particular flashes of class in the try finished by Ross Thompson along with some promising performances by players making their way in the game.
“These captains challenges are dragging the game out, delaying the game. I know I'm bound to say that because we got three tries disallowed, but we were out there for something like two hours. The sooner we move on the better,” said Wilson.
“It is easy to call a captains challenge and then wait for someone on the sideline to tell you what you are actually challenging.”
While Wilson was unhappy with that, he was very happy with the form of man-of-the-match Rory Darge and other youngsters.
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 hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel