Sean Everitt lifts lid on Edinburgh's eye-catching subs amid two Scotland injuries

Head coach hails team for battling back in Champions Cup

Edinburgh Rugby head coach Sean Everitt says his team’s resilience has kept them in the hunt for progression in the Champions Cup after beating Gloucester 26-24 at Hive Stadium.

The capital side were 18-5 down at half time, but responded strongly in the second period, bagging a bonus-point win. They move up to second place in Pool 2 ahead of next Friday’s match against leaders Bath. In a congested group, the victory was essential.

“We said we wanted to get 10 points out of the two home games and we've done that,” said Everitt. “Obviously, we've got to wait for other results to see what we need to do next week but if we didn't get to 10 tonight, it would have been really difficult for us.

“It keeps us in the hunt and like I say next week a couple of points will be really good or four away at home and you've got to be realistic, four points away to both will be fantastic. We'll need to improve on what we delivered tonight.

“It was obviously difficult conditions to hold onto the ball and we did want to play rugby to get the bonus point, and we probably suffered a little bit from that in the first half.

“They went hard at our ball at the breakdown and disrupted us, but a good chat in the changing room at half-time and we were able to sort that out and got into the 22 and finished off.

“You can make the job a lot easier if you're just patient in those areas of the field and a lot more clinical in the second half than we were in the first half.”

Everitt made an eye-catching change on the half-hour mark by changing his whole front row by introducing Pierre Schoeman, Ewan Ashman and Paul Hill for James Whitcombe, Harri Morris and Ollie Blyth-Lafferty. The coach said the move was pre-meditated - and it paid off. Edinburgh were better for it and Ashman scored one of the tries in the second half.

The front row change

“Well, we saw an opportunity in the power game,” explained Everitt. “OBL is part of our pathway programme at Edinburgh. I wanted to continue with him. James Whitcombe didn't get any time last week, so I wanted to reward him as well. Harri Morris has been going well and we just thought that with those three coming off the bench, which we did last season successfully, that we'd get ascendancy.

“I thought we were maybe a little bit unlucky on one of the scrums but we certainly did get the power game going when they came on in the first half and then led into the second half.

“We spoke to the team about it and everyone knew what the plan was. So, they weren't shocked. What you don't want to do is pull players off after 30 minutes and let them think that they're not performing, but they had a job to do for 30 minutes.”

Edinburgh did finish with injury concerns. Centre Matt Currie hurt his hamstring and Duhan van der Merwe has a calf complaint. “Matt Currie left with a hamstring injury,” said Everitt. “Duhan we pulled off with a tight calf. We're not sure how bad that is, but we've got a couple of walking wounded at the moment. We're in week seven of a 10-week run. We've got a long list of injuries as it is. So, there's obviously pressure on the players that are delivering every week.”

Everitt also reserved praise for flanker Freddy Douglas, who was named man of the match. “Outstanding rugby player,” added the coach. “When teams are expansive, it does play into his hands, but it's a team effort to force the players inside for him to be able to get those opportunities. But, two man of the matches in two weeks. I'm sure he's a very happy man and we're proud of him.”