CRAIG Chalmers knows what it takes to reach the pinnacle of Scottish rugby, having played for Scotland in 60 Tests and worn the famous British and Irish Lions jersey.
As a result, the 39-year-old enters his third season as a Division 1 club coach with his club Melrose not only setting the same goal he fixed as a player every August, to bring the Scottish Championship trophy to the Greenyards, but also passionatel
y exhorting his young charges to aim higher.
The club has watched Calum MacRae, Kelly Brown and Mark Robertson, among others, turn professional in recent years, Brown becoming a mainstay of the Scotland back row, and yesterday David Whiteford, a talented winger who came from Highland via Peebles several years ago, flew to France as part of Glasgow's pre-season squad with Chalmers' blessing.
Chalmers said: "In many ways it's much harder now for players to make it to the Scotland squad than it was when I played because you have to be a professional and there are not many contracts available with only two teams in Scotland.
"David was a top performer for us last season and I chat regularly with Sean Lineen (Glasgow coach], and he's always asking about club players. I told him David was doing well and Sean asked to look at him. He must have liked what he saw to take him on tour. I don't know if it will lead to anything more for David at this stage, but it's an example of how the club game can still provide the stage for players to become professionals.
"In other ways, though, it can be easier for youngsters now than it was for me, because once you're in the system as a teenager you're less likely to drop off the radar than when I was coming through. The kids also get much more guidance, fitness, weights and nutrition advice, whereas we had to work harder with our clubs and training ourselves to find an edge.
"But the big difference is we could play for eight or ten clubs and get the exposure you needed to attract the Scotland selectors. It's not like that now, but what I'm stressing to the Melrose players is that if they perform at this level it can still provide the exposure they need to open doors to the pro clubs."
The month of August is where clubs now step-up their pre-season training, but it is also a time when players with itchy feet cause headaches for coaches. Jim Hay, the Hawick coach, admitted this week that he was disappointed to hear of three young Hawick players heading to Melrose, while Chalmers was frustrated to be told when on holiday that his young prop Kieran Cooney was heading to Spain.
"Apparently he's got a professional contract," said Chalmers. "He was going to a second division club in Ireland and we persuaded him to stay, and then I got a call to say he's going to a Spanish club nobody's heard of, who have about five professionals. I've said that I don't want to hold players back, but he's just 21 and having watched him come on hugely in his time at Melrose I really felt he could push for the next step-up here." His frustration is understandable perhaps, but what of the three Teries, lock Gav Petrie and promising teenagers Lindsay Gibson and Darren Young, he has 'poached'?
"Hardly poached," he responded. "We have a Hawick coach involved at the club and these boys said to him they didn't want to stay in Hawick for various reasons and asked if they could join us.
"We have a youth system with Melrose Wasps, but it's still a town of less than 3,000 people, so it's difficult to produce all our own talent year after year.
"Chalmers has also lost New Zealander Glen Stewart, but replaced him with James Lew, from Sydney, who played in the Australia Sevens team with Jordan Macey, the Melrose full-back.
"This club has a great tradition of fighting well above its weight and there's no reason why we can't be champions again with this squad," Chalmers added.
"Boroughmuir won by a big margin last season, but they won many games by just a few points while we never lost a game by more than eight points all season. We never lost in about 13 or 14 games towards the end, and ended up with the Scottish Cup.
"Third in the league and the cup is the standard set and we now have to improve on that. It won't be easy – there are very good clubs in this league – but that kind of ambition is what Melrose is about."
The full article contains 799 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
