Douglas: Bravehearts thrived on Kiwi contempt

Scotland prop Luke Douglas has revealed just how deep the New Zealand contempt for the facilities at Workington was on Friday night, and how it helped inspire the Scots.

Scotland battled hard to hold the Kiwis to an 18-18 draw in Cumbria on Friday night, and Douglas relished the experience.

“We were packing down in the scrums and they were literally saying ‘this is a sh**hole’,” Douglas told Scottish newspaper The Herald.

“That was what we were thriving on. We knew it was going to be tight in the sheds, we knew the field was going to be small, it was going to be bad weather, it was going to be cold and we saw all that as being in our favour.

“We knew what it was like to play here and we gave it our all, came up with a draw and we could be proud for our families and the way we played for each other.

“It’s a special moment coming up against the Haka and people can say they under-estimated us, all that sort of stuff, but we still gave it to them in parts, we scored a few tries and the boys have got to be proud.”

Douglas’s brother Kane is a second row forward in rugby union, and has been a Wallabies international regular in recent years.

Luke Douglas feels that there is little comparison, at least in terms of resource, between the Australian national rugby union team and Scotland Rugby League.

“I don’t think you can really compare the Wallabies to Scotland Rugby League, definitely not,” he said.

“They get put up everywhere, flown over in business class… We haven’t got the money like the other big teams in rugby league, but we work with what we’ve got and my hat goes off to guys like Keith (Hogg, the chairman), Ollie (Cruickshank, the team manager), all the staff, Steve (McCormack) our coach, they’re doing it for the love and they’re doing it for us as players.

“They put in the hard yards. They don’t get any financial benefits from it, but they’re there for us and help us out in any way they can.”