Wales lock Ian Evans has said any verbal tricks played by former coach Scott Johnson ahead of next week’s Six Nations international at Murrayfield will come as no surprise to him.
Whatever else the Australian, in caretaker charge of Scotland, can resist it certainly isn’t a colourful phrase, with the former Ospreys and Wales boss comparing the Scots’ extraordinary come-from-behind victory over Ireland last week to boxing great Muhammad Ali’s ‘rope-a-dope’ defeat of George Foreman in the ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ in Zaire back in 1974.
“He is quite a character, really,” Evans said of Johnson. “He likes to put himself out in the press, trying to ramble some jargon and trying to play mind-games.
“His worst fear is probably that he’s coached most of the boys within our squad, so we will more or less know how his mindset is.
“So he can ramble as much as he wants, it just becomes pretty boring in the end,” Evans said.
“Rugby is a pretty basic game, isn’t it? I don’t think you need to add fuel to the fire,” the down-to-earth second row insisted.
“There is no doubt that there will be [mind games next week]. But, like I said, it’s boring, for me anyway.”