West of Scotland District (rugby union)

West of Scotland District is a select provincial amateur rugby union team that draws its players from the West of Scotland.

Not to be confused with West of Scotland F.C..
West of Scotland
Full nameWest of Scotland District
Founded1876

Founded in 1876, the West of Scotland District team - and its corresponding East of Scotland District team - was created, thus halving Scotland's representative rugby union area in two.

This was meant as an impetus to include players from beyond the original Glasgow District and Edinburgh District catchment areas.

The West of Scotland District versus the East of Scotland District became the de facto trial match for the Scotland international team.

It survives today, but only for age-grade.[1]

History

Formation
Main article: Scottish District rugby structure

To include other players when selecting the international team, the East v West District match was introduced by the Scottish Rugby Union in the 1875-76 season.

The match was first played on 28 February 1876.[2]

On the advent of the East v West match, the Inter-City match between Glasgow District and Edinburgh District - previously a twice annual match - was cut down to one fixture per year.[3]

Trial matches

The East v West match was used as the premier Trial match for the Scotland international side. Although intended to increase representation from outwith Glasgow and Edinburgh, as this was the premier trial match both Glasgow and Edinburgh players were eligible for selection for their corresponding West and East sides.

Another Trial match, a Blues v Whites match was introduced in the 1877-88 season. The Blues v Whites match evolved into a 'Probables' v 'Possibles' match for Scotland selection.[4]

The East v West match remained the premier Trial match for Scotland until the late 1920s. It was at this stage that the Blues v Whites match overtook it in importance.

Age-grade format

The East v West match continued in its same format till 1948. It then switched to an age-grade format and was used for selecting the best Under 23 players for Scotland.

Hiatus

When the Scottish Inter-District Championship began its own grade tournament, the East v West matches were curtailed.

Resurrection

The West of Scotland District and East of Scotland District representative sides have recently been re-surrected at age-grade levels. These matches are now used as trial matches to identify candidates for the Scottish Rugby Academy and potential Glasgow Warriors, Edinburgh Rugby and Scotland stars of the future.[5]

Notable former players

Scotland Internationalists
gollark: The world would probably be rendered with OpenGL or something.
gollark: Otterly reduckulous.
gollark: If it's sandboxed webassembly it's still more likely for bugs allowing poking of at least the WASM memory area to creep in.
gollark: ~~WebAssembly~~
gollark: Why JS? Why not C, then, which is always crazy and stupid?

References
  1. https://www.scottishrugby.org/news/16/10/21/east-v-west-age-grade-teams-announced-decisive-inter-national
  2. "Register | British Newspaper Archive". www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk.
  3. "History". Glasgow Warriors.
  4. "Register | British Newspaper Archive". www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk.
  5. https://www.scottishrugby.org/news/16/10/21/east-v-west-age-grade-teams-announced-decisive-inter-national
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.