Tonight's rugby news as Scotland international says his old coach 'would love' Wales job and Ireland call in six players
The latest headlines from Wales and around the world
These are your evening rugby headlines on Sunday, February 16.
Smith 'would love Wales job'
Glasgow Warriors boss Franco Smith "would love" to become Wales' new permanent head coach, according to his former player Ryan Wilson.
Alongside Simon Easterby and Michael Cheika, Smith has emerged as a frontrunner for the job, following Warren Gatland's departure last week. While he is contracted to the Warriors until the end of next year, the man himself has certainly not played down the speculation linking him to the role and admitted prior to his side's 20-45 win over the Dragons on Sunday that he would like to return to coaching at international level.
Addressing the links, former Scotland back row Wilson - who was on punditry duty for Premier Sports at Rodney Parade - believes that the appointment of ex-Italy boss Smith could prove to be a mutually beneficial move for the coach and the Welsh Rugby Union.
That is, of course, if Scotland don't get there first, with Smith - who won the URC title with Glasgow last season - also seen as a potential candidate to replace under-fire head coach Gregor Townsend.
"In all seriousness, why wouldn't you look at someone like Franco Smith?," said Wilson as he reflected on the Wales links. "Look at what he did for Italian rugby to start with, and look at where they're going. We talked about Wales being poor last week but I think Italian rugby is fantastic at the moment and really on the up.
"He put the foundations in there and then came in and did wonders for Glasgow Warriors. So you look at it and think, yeah, that could be a shout there."
"I think it's the sort of job that he would love to get his hands on," Wilson added. "I genuinely think [that]. He wants to be involved in all the day-to-day stuff but he can put the foundations in for a nation, certainly.
"Who doesn't want to go to a World Cup? I could see Franco Smith wanting to go to a World Cup, whether that's with Wales or potentially Scotland at some point, because there's also the chat around that."
Ireland call in six ahead of Cardiff clash
Ireland have called in six players to their Six Nations squad ahead of facing Wales in Cardiff next weekend.
The uncapped duo of John Hodnett and Diarmuid Mangan have been called up alongside Gavin Coombes, Stuart McCloskey, Jacob Stockdale and Nick Timoney, the IRFU confirmed in a squad update on Sunday.
Iain Henderson and Cormac Izuchukwu have both been declared unavailable for selection for the Principality Stadium clash due to hamstring and ankle injuries respectively, with Ulster duo staying with their province to start their rehabilitation programmes.
Meanwhile, the workloads of Caelan Doris (knee) and Rónan Kelleher (neck) are being managed this week, with Mack Hansen and Joe McCarthy returning to train with the squad and Tadhg Furlong continuing to make progress.
Munster scrum-half Craig Casey will also head into camp this week as he bids to return to action over the coming months, having undergone knee surgery in December.
Georgia star makes history
Georgia wing Aka Tabutsadze has become one of the top 10 try scorers in Test rugby history after crossing twice in his side's 62-32 thrashing of Spain in the Rugby Europe Championship.
The 27-year-old is in red-hot form - with 11 tries in his last 10 Test matches - and that continued in Madrid on Sunday, with his brace of tries including a superb solo score from 55 metres out. His career tally now stands at 46 Test tries, putting him at joint 10th in the all-time scorers list alongside New Zealand trio Joe Rokocoko, Julian Savea and Christian Cullen.
Tabutsadze has reached that milestone in incredibly quick time, having won just 48 Test caps. His ratio of 0.96 tries per game ranks him above everyone else in the global top 10, apart from the all-time top try-scorer, Daisuke Onata of Japan, who scored 69 tries in 58 appearances.
Alongside Onata and fellow Japan international Hirotoki Onozawa, Tabutsadze is one of three Tier 2 players to feature in the all-time top 10 try-scorers.
With potentially two further games - a semi-final and final - to come in this year's Rugby Europe Championship, Tabutsadze could climb even higher in the charts by the end of the tournament. If he reaches a career half-century of tries, for example, he would move ahead of Brian O'Driscoll, George North and Doug Howlett to draw level with England's Rory Underwood in joint sixth place.
Sheedy 'frustrated' after Connacht defeat
Cardiff fly-half Callum Sheedy has aired his frustrations after his side fell to defeat against Connacht on Saturday night.
The Blue & Blacks went into the half-time break in Galway 19-0 down but fought back to level the scores through tries from Rey Lee-Lo, Ben Donnell and debutant Callum Braley. However, mistakes saw Connacht seal a crucial try and, after being denied a certain penalty in the final phase, Cardiff fell to a 24-19 defeat.
The loss sees Matt Sherratt's side fall to sixth in the URC and a frustrated Sheedy admitted following the match that he and his teammates must improve their accuracy and discipline if they are to avoid slipping further down the table.
“It’s a bit frustrating," said the Wales international. "I think first half especially, we were quite inaccurate in what we did. To give a side like Connacht a 19 point head start, it’s always going to be difficult to get back into the game. It was a great fight to go back to 19-all but inevitably, discipline and inaccuracies let us down again.
"We know we’ve got fight, we know we’ll battle for everything, but it’s probably at the stage now where we can’t just accept getting a good losing bonus point or being close in games. You’ve got to show fight and turn those close games into wins
"So the fight will always be incredible in this group, because they’re a great group of boys. It’s just how we’re a bit more accurate, to turn those good fights into wins," he added. "We have to control what we can control. It’s quite easy to look outside of what we control – this could have happened, this didn’t happen, but we need to be better, simple as that. We can be better.”