Scotland reveal 27-man squad for Japan tour

Head coach Vern Cotter has announced the squad that will face the Brave Blossoms in June. The majority of the squad comprises of players who featured for Cotter’s side at last year’s World Cup and 6 Nations.

The only noticeable exclusion is Glasgow centre Mark Bennett who is working towards a place in Team GB’s Olympic sevens squad ahead of the Rio games.

“Being a two-match tour, rather than three, allows us to take a smaller squad - a tight group, though opportunities still remain for other players to come
noticeable

“This squad still has a lot of work to do to get better and this is another opportunity to analyse our last game against Ireland and the RBS 6 Nations Championship as a whole, in order to move forward.

“We will be working on becoming smarter in the way that we look to win, with winning, of course, being our focus.

“The first game will be especially tough. We have five days to prepare following our arrival in Japan to face a team one place below us in the world rankings, on home soil.

“You only have to look at the crowd numbers and the passion that the Japanese people have at the Sunwolves [inaugural Japanese Super Rugby team] fixtures at home to know that this will be a real test for the players.

The tour has the added significance of being in the host country of the next World Cup, with Cotter conscious of the added importance of Test results as the pool draw looms this coming season.

“We are aware of the fact that the world rankings for the Rugby World Cup are ongoing, and that the only way we’ll influence those ranking positively is to win games,” said Cotter.