WHAT a difference a win makes. Three days ago, almost 4,000 people who had paid for tickets to watch Scotland play at Murrayfield could not be bothered to turn up. Wind the clock forward to yesterday and suddenly there was so much demand for tickets to watch the next match at the stadium, against England on February 25, that the queue for the final release started at 5am and by the time the office opened four hours later there were more than 500 there.
Desperation to get hands on tickets for the Calcutta Cup encounter was so great that the Scottish Rugby Union’s internet site could not cope with the demand and was brought to a standstill as people who could not make it to the ground tried to log on and get their buy tickets that, by then, were becoming a valuable commodity.
The knock-on effects of Sunday’s 20-16 win over France also go far beyond renewed enthusiasm from the fans, with Gordon McKie, the chief executive, revealing that already there has been a noticeable increase in interest from commercial organisations and potential sponsors. “We were always going to sell out if we had sold more tickets in England, but we decided not to do that and to hold back a final allocation for this week for the first time,” he said.
“There is a belief in the team and the wider squad. There was noise here during the autumn tests for the first time in years, even though they were small crowds for reasons that we all know. The feelgood factor runs through the organisation, and that includes the team dressing-room.”
It was certainly one factor that played a large role in the decision of one of Scotland’s stars from Sunday to pledge immediate his future to the game in Scotland. Mike Blair, the scrum half, was joined by Simon Webster, the wing, in signing a new contract with Edinburgh before heading out for the first training session of the week in preparation for the match in Cardiff on Sunday.
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“Everybody who is Scottish and plays professional rugby should be aiming to make rugby a main game again,” Blair said. “The last couple of years it has slipped back a bit, a long way behind football. The crowd numbers and support have fallen. From about the time Frank (Hadden) took over, I don’t know if that is just a coincidence, things have been on a high, the professional teams have been doing well and with the win on Sunday we will see more people coming out of the woodwork.
“We drove past on the bus 500 people queueing for tickets and I am sure we would not have had that if we had not won. Success breeds a bit of confidence and we hope the country can get behind us again.”
The team clearly took a lot of pride in arriving at Murrayfield to see the fans so obviously flocking back after a long period when you could barely give away tickets to Murrayfield games. In the autumn, when the players showed the first signs that they were starting to become competitive on the international stage, two of the games were played in front of fewer than 15,000 people and even the All Blacks failed to draw more than 50,000 to the 67,500-seat stadium.
In common with the rest of the team — though Blair still sees Scotland as “heavy underdogs” against Wales on Sunday — he says that there is a confidence and belief in the side that he has not seen before.
“We beat France in a contest that was more about rugby than some of our other wins. When we beat England five years ago it was more of a tactical contest in bad weather, when pride and guts and all that won through. But on Sunday we really showed that we could play rugby, though passion was a key element. We played good rugby, sensible rugby but exciting rugby at times, too.”
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That is exactly what has so enthused the fans. None of the stand-out wins over the past five years have been achieved in a manner that so excited people as the vibrant, attacking style on show at Murrayfield on Sunday. The success of the national side also has to be set against a background of consistently improving results at the next level down, with Edinburgh second in the Celtic League and putting down a serious challenge to win the competition, another reason for Blair staying part of the set-up.
Elsewhere, the Borders have been dragged up from rock bottom to respectability and while Glasgow are losing too many games, they are mostly by tight margins while producing a fast, thrilling style of play.