It was an opening week defeat for Reuben Logan and his Scotland U20 teammates as Italy ran out comfortable winners on Friday night.
The Northampton Saints back-rower, son of former Stirling County and Scotland legend Kenny, made his debut in the navy blue at the Hive – with his dad and TV presenter mum Gabby joining a strong family contingent on the night.
He was a force at number eight as the Scots attempted to turn around a dismal set of results at youth team level, but it was the Italians who had control of the contest – scoring three tries to the Scots’ two to run out 22-10 victors.
Before the match, Reuben had spoken of his pride over turning out for the same nation as his dad – despite having lived his entire life south of the border.
He told the Offside Line: “I think my dad pretended when I was with England that he was happy with it.
“But he really wasn’t, and he’s made that very clear now. He struggled with it.
“And I think he’s very, very happy [now]. He’s excited.
“I think my mum was just as emotional as my dad, because she’s seen my dad wear that shirt.
“I sent her the media photos and she got quite emotional seeing them, because my dad used to wear the same thistle.”
The Scots’ scores from Billy Allen and Oliver Duncan weren’t able to pin back the impressive Italians, with Federico Zanadrea, Niccolo Benni and Eduardo Todaro on target to ensure it was a perfect away start for
them.
Scotland U20 head coach said post-match said: “I think the big themes in the game were we weren’t clinical enough and our speed to contact.
“They jackaled pretty hard, pretty aggressively and we were just a wee bit slow to get to contact, which was the biggest learnings in the game really for me.
“I thought we allowed them to get back into the game in the first 10 minutes after half-time and I think they just lived off that, to be honest.”