Super Bowls: Scully captains USA as wife watches Super Bowl

Blaine Scully has won 29 caps for the United States, scoring seven tries

When do you miss your husband captaining his country for the first time? When you've got Super Bowl tickets...

As Blaine Scully was leading his team out against Argentina in Houston on Saturday - wife Shannon was 1,800 miles away in California getting ready to watch the Denver Broncos beat Carolina Panthers in Super Bowl 50.

The Cardiff Blues back skippered the USA to a 35-35 draw in the inaugural Americas Rugby tournament and he didn't mind his beloved not being there.

"My wife was at the Super Bowl - it was awesome for her," Scully said.

Super Bowl takes priority

Peyton Manning helped the Denver Broncos beat the Carolina Panthers to win the 2016 Super Bowl

Scully was in the USA for a week ahead of the US playing Argentina, part of the inaugural six-team Americas Rugby Championship (ARC) between USA, Argentina, Canada, Uruguay, Chile and Brazil.

Scully was watched by his mother, but wife Shannon had other ideas.

"I didn't get a chance to see my family. My wife already had plans to go to the Super Bowl with her dad, which was awesome for them," he told BBC Wales.

"She's said we are both going to the Super Bowl next year.

"They had it booked a year in advance, so it was an awesome chance for her to go.

"My wife is a Philadelphia Eagles fan and I am a San Francisco 49ers fan - this is a big deal!

"We were both rooting for Peyton Manning, the Denver Broncos quarterback. We wanted him to go out like he did - he's a legendary quarterback.

"The game was at the new 49ers stadium too, I haven't been there yet."

Transferrable skills

Scully will play for the Blues in Treviso this Saturday in the Pro 12 and the former Leicester Tigers player feels the USA can do more to encourage youngsters to play rugby, rather than American football.

"I think there are transferrable skills between American football and rugby," he said.

"But one of the challenges is, it [American football] is a very specialised sport and some of the athletes on the field barely touch the ball.

"The challenge for us is exposing younger athletes to rugby earlier."

Six Nations inspiration

Scully feels the Americas Rugby Championship, which mimics Europe's Six Nations Championship, will boost all the countries involved.

"For everyone who is a rugby fan in America, the Six Nations is a big deal," Scully explained.

"It's one of the premier competitions in the world and one of the aspirations for the Americas Six Nations [is to emulate it].

"We see it as a really good model and an opportunity for our country to develop the way the home nations are able to.

"The exposure and calibre of competition should translate to success and competing at the highest level, the World Cup."