Rugby World Cup 2019: Gordon Reid on his Scotland team-mates
- Published
Who looks like a 'fat slug' in Speedos? And who does the best Gregor Townsend impression?
With the Scotland squad out in Japan for at least a month, spending every day together, a good team spirit is essential.
So who are the characters in Gregor Townsend's 31-man squad? Prop Gordon Reid takes BBC Scotland behind the scenes.
'The music man' - Finn Russell
Finn Russell knows his tunes
Finn Russell walks about with all his free stuff from Bose. He gets supplied with endless amounts of speakers and music products. He's got into some French numbers which I'm just not liking - French rap. He's the go-to music man.
The impressionist - Ryan Wilson
Ryan Wilson 'loves to wind people up'
Ryan likes to be 'everyone, look at me'. He likes to make fun out of everybody, he loves winding people up. And even to have him in your pack you know you're going to get a lot of chat to the other prop winding him up, it's good for me because I just get on with my job. He's really good at accents. He does a good Gregor accent, he does a good Tommy Seymour accent too.
The snorer - Zander Fagerson
Zander Ferguson knows the snore
He is the biggest snorer you'll ever hear, honestly I was like 'my goodness, I've never heard anything like it'. We need to get him a sponsor actually, a sleep angel sponsor or someone to give him one of those breathing masks to help him snore. There's been a couple of times he's been a bit raging at me because I've punched him. It used to be Jon Welsh but Zander's taken over the reins, he's phenomenal at snoring.
'Darren joins us on nights out' - The Mystery Man
There is then the man who we won't name, because he is totally different to his usual persona. I've actually been pretty tame [on nights out]. I used to be given a bottle of Buckfast and I was on the game but not anymore, I'm a wee bit older. There's a Darren in the team, but I can't tell you who the Darren is. It's basically a guy who comes out on a night out and it's one of the guys who goes from being himself to somebody else. So Darren comes out a few times with us on a night out.
The swearer - Me
You can swear by Gordon Reid
I'm the swearer of the group. I like to swear at everybody and curse, just in general. 'You are a such and such, you're a this'. I think it's just the years of not being allowed to swear when I was growing up. Now I'm a bit older I have to make it up. If my mum knew I swore she would go off her head at me.
The fashionistas - Adam Hasting and Blair Kinghorn
Adam Hastings and Blair Kinghorn love to dress to impress
Best dressed? Hastles [Adam Hastings] loves to look sharp and Blair Kinghorn, too. They wear white trainers, which I'm just a no go. Whatever's there I just throw on, but these boys love their party gear. Fagerson loves a budgie smuggler. He looks like a fat slug in a budgie smuggler. There's quite a lot of boys that wear them, I just don't. I've got a dad bod - probably a fat-dad bod.
The gamer - WP Nel
Night owl gaming fanatic WP Nel
I usually room with WP Nel. He's a quiet guy but he doesn't really let anyone know that he's actually quite a funny guy. He's really quiet with everybody else but when he gets in his room, you just can't shut him up. He likes his games so you go in and he's maybe up to one or two in the morning sometimes, playing games. He's got stupid wee games like stick golf or rugby and he plays it on his phone all the time.
The inseparables - Ali Price and Finn Russell/Stuart Hogg and Greig Laidlaw
The bromance is strong between Greig Laidlaw and Stuart Hogg
You've got Ali Price and Finn who are just always at each other's hip.
You've got Hoggy and Greig Laidlaw who are always at each other's hip too, the Borders boys. I think wee Darcy is trying to get into that group. He's like the boy of the group, the baby. So they're trying to take him under their wing.
'You could go for a drink with anyone'
Gregor Townsend has chosen his squad wisely
You could go for a coffee with everybody, you could go for a drink with everybody. I think that's also why Gregor's has gone with this team. He's went 'these guys can play' but we also want some characters.
I wouldn't say there are any cliques and that's just a cancer for a team. Everybody's looking forward to it, everybody's excited.