Ross Thompson backed to prove a point at Edinburgh

The talented fly-half travelled along the M8 this summer after struggling for regular gametime under Warriors boss Franco Smith.

Thompson displayed huge promise after debuting for Glasgow in early 2021 and earned his Scotland debut later that year but his career has stagnated recently. 

Edinburgh head coach Sean Everitt has preferred the 25-year-old to fellow Scotland international Ben Healy in the opening two games of the URC season and attack coach Mathie has backed the fly-half.

“He's a highly motivated individual,” Mathie replied when asked if Thompson had something to prove.

“He's a really astute learner and he drives the game really well. I think there's a lot of fuel for him to show what he's about. He's had two opportunities already and obviously he'll have many more to come.

Scott Mathie speaks to the media (Image: SNS) “What's nice is that a lot of the Scottish players know each other really well and he's got a lot of mates in the club. That has helped him settle really well. I think that's the first big thing.

"As far as integration into the team, he's slotted in pretty seamlessly, to be honest. He's a very composed player and allows players around him to really succeed. I think that's been something that I've really admired in his game.

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“As with all new players, I think myself included as a coach, when you come into a new club and a new team, it takes time with all these things to really be as comfortable as you can. I think if I see what Ross is doing at the moment and every following week, I'm just seeing more and more of that come to the fore.”

Edinburgh will be looking to avenge two hugely frustrating defeats to start the URC season when they play their second game in South Africa against the Lions on Saturday. 

Duhan van der Merwe looks to beat Bulls' David Kriel (Image: SNS) Mark Bennett and Dave Cherry sustained injuries against the Bulls, and Mathie provided an injury update on the Scotland duo as well as Argentinian international Emiliano Boffelli.

“We're still waiting for the final assessment on those boys,” he said of the injured Scotland duo.

“Mo (Tuipulotu) should be good to go. He's been training this week, so I think that's a positive. The other boys, we're just waiting for final confirmation on them. So we should have news on that pretty shortly.

"Boff is going through that process now [seeing a specialist] so that's really under assessment. We haven't had final confirmation on all those things yet.”