Edinburgh boost squad for next season all in one day

Edinburgh have further bolstered their squad ahead of next season with the announcement of five signings on what the Edinburgh PR department have dubbed #MagicMonday.

Chief headline for cynical types like us will be the retention of Hamish “Pinball” Watson on a new two year deal but there is a boost for both forwards and backs from further afield.

6ft 4in, 115kg flanker Nick Haining – who has previously represented Jersey Reds – will make the move north from Bristol Bears in the summer. Haining is Australian, but Scottish qualified.

He’ll add some further strength in depth in that back-row where we’ve got a lot of internationals. He’s a very good player and he’s keen to put his hand up and try to push himself into the national squad as well. He’s a big boy, carries the ball very well and is a good footballer.

Richard Cockerill on Nick Haining

Adding more back rows is worrying for Edinburgh fans who see a squad stacked with a lot of our favourites, but with Barclay, Ritchie, Mata and Bradbury currently signed to deals there’s going to be limited room for those left. As Sandy’s tweet below shows, Luke Hamilton, Ally Miller and a few others are all out of contract this year. I’m sure the Warrior Nation – who are panicking about contract news again – might like a couple of Cockerill-toughened forwards to help them out in certain areas but Edinburgh seem to have pinned down the best ones.

To answer a question above there's no list as such. The following are OOC this summer – Ford, Ceccarelli, CHH, Watson, Hamilton, Miller, Fowles, Kennedy, Brown and Hoyland.

— Sandy Smith (@bigparahandy) March 25, 2019

Also inbound in the pack is Southern Kings hooker Mike Willemse (26) who has been brought in to cover the inevitable absences of Stuart McInally on Scotland duty, on a two year deal.

He’s a very competent hooker that plays in the style of Stuart Mclnally. We’ve got a good selection of Scottish hookers, but Mike is a guy who’ll be with us all year round and will no doubt push everybody to the next level.

Richard Cockerill

It suggests that cap centurion Ross Ford could be either retiring or moving on, come the end of the season. We’re hearing rumours someone in France D2 might pick up a 100-cap international and British & Irish Lion for a bargain rate!

Richard Cockerill has long-since announced his desire for a “Goneva-style” winger hailing from the Pacific so with that in mind, he’s signed two.

They are Perpignan wing and Fiji Sevens player Eroni “The Sledgehammer” Sau (29) and Fiji Sevens captain
Kalione Nasoko (28) who were both part of the Gold Coast Commonwealth Sevens silver medal-winning team.

Kalione Nasoko made his Fiji Sevens debut in 2016 and was named in the HSBC World Series Dream Team in his first season on the circuit. The winger/centre was also awarded Player of the Final at the 2017 Hong Kong Sevens as well as picking up winners’ medals in Hamilton, Vancouver, Singapore, Hong-Kong and London. To date he’s played 142 games on the HSBC World Rugby Sevens circuit, scoring 63 tries.

Kalione brings something different to our back-three. He gives us a little bit more of an x-factor and, as you see with the good teams around Europe, you need that type of threat.”

Richard Cockerill

Sau made his Fiji Sevens debut in 2017 and earned him the Rookie of the Season title and a place in the overall Series Dream Team that year.

After speaking with Richard Cockerill and my friend Viliame Mata, I knew it would be a great move for my rugby career and also for my family. I can’t wait to work hard in the summer to earn a place in the team next year.

Eroni Sau

A stronger Fijian contingent in Scotland – a pretty alien environment compared to Suva, weatherwise at least – can only help all of them grow and improve as well as teaching the art of unpredictability to our homegrown talents like Darcy Graham.

The final announcement of the day was either going to please Edinburgh fans looking for a scrum-half or those desperate to hang on to Hamish Watson, and as it is Watson will stay with the club until 2021.

We’ve got a great coaching staff and I want to win something with Edinburgh. If that takes two years or ten years, it doesn’t matter. This group of players and coaches is going places and I love the direction that the club is moving in.

Hamish Watson

So with the pack looking pretty well reinforced for next season it’s the backline that is still shrouded in a little fog. Tom Brown, Damien Hoyland, Nathan Fowles and Sean Kennedy are both still out of contract. The backline has been bolstered with the Fijians, but can we see Cockerill leaving Charlie Shiel possibly the only backup to Henry Pyrgos should the situation continue? Seems likely one of them at least will be retained, unless there’s any money left in the bank…

What we also know for next season: Allan Dell is set to join London Irish; Glasgow prop Jamie Bhatti has already been announced as his replacement.

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