Scotland not getting the benefit of youth and young manhood

And, with two excellent tries in a 28-36 loss to Leinster, Dutch winger Tim Visser was the pick of the Edinburgh crop and should already be picking the tartan for his kilt.

Edinburgh fielded an experimental midfield of stand-off Harry Leonard and inside centre Matt Scott. The former is just 19, while ex-Currie stand-off Scott is 21. These two, along with 20-year-old stand-off Gregor Hunter, who wasn’t involved on Friday, represent the future midfield hopes of the club. Leonard enjoyed a mixed debut, distributing well but conceding a try to Isaac Boss while being held back by a hand in a ruck. Welcome to professional rugby.

But, towards the end of the match, Leonard and Scott combined brilliantly to score a cracking try when the stand-off weighted his grubber perfectly for the centre to score.

At the respective ages of 19, 20 and 21 the trio of Leonard, Hunter and Scott are all just starting their professional careers. But they would be considered veterans in Wales where youth is given its head and not just in the World Cup squad where 19-year-old George North was good for the semi-final.

In the 2010 Six Nations, Tom Prydie became the youngest Welshman to win a cap. The Ospreys winger was 18 years and 25 days old and didn’t look out of place. He has since struggled with injury but he still boasts more Welsh caps than he has had starts for the Ospreys.

Two weeks ago the Dragons fielded the youngest Welshman to ever play regional rugby in Hallam Amos, who was 17 years and 28 days old when he started an LV= Cup match against Wasps. We have to hope he enjoyed the notoriety of his achievement while it lasted because 33 minutes into the very same match a 16-year-old blood replacement came off the bench for a brief seven-minute stint.

Winger Jack Dixon won’t turn 17 until 13 December of this year and yet, two weeks ago, he found himself marking former England winger Tom Varndell in that same LV= Cup tie.

You may imagine that a 16-year-old is too young for professional rugby, and you may be right, but the Dragons coaching staff emphasised that they thought Dixon was ready for the challenge or they wouldn’t have put him on the bench.

These guys make the Edinburgh trio of Hunter, Leonard and Scott, who are only on apprentice contracts, look like gnarled old veterans.

In other countries at 20 you aren’t developing, you’ve either arrived or you’ve already been shown the door. The Ospreys gave promising 18-year-old centre Mathew Jarvis a start back in 2009 (against Edinburgh as it happens). By the time he was 20 the Welsh region had seen enough and released him. He joined Connacht where he remains to this day.

Perhaps Jarvis will use the disappointment to spur himself on to bigger and better things. Some players develop later than others but none, it appears, develop later than Scots. At the same age that Matt Scott first signed professional forms, Jarvis had already been shuffled out of the back door by the Ospreys.

Despite being asked to play one or two places wider than his club position of stand-off and being in his first professional season, Scott looks the part. Oddly enough, a little like winger/fullback Tom Brown, the midfielder looks significantly better playing for Edinburgh than he ever did in Currie’s colours.

The point is that some players make the move up the ladder without a hiccup, they raise their game when surrounded by quality, and the successful ones are not always easy to identify. Look at Rhys Priestland, who was only catapulted into the Welsh No.10 jersey thanks to an injury to Stephen Jones but, once there, became the star of their World Cup campaign.

If someone had taken a chance and picked Scott for Edinburgh two years ago, when he was just 19, maybe now, with two years of professional rugby under his belt, he’d be in a position to give Andy Robinson some midfield options.

Goodness knows the Scotland coach needs them.