Forgotten Scotland man targets Six Nations return after 'fairly extensive MOT'

The tournament kicks off for Scotland with a home game against Italy on February 1 and Skinner hopes to have a good few club games under his belt by then.

Next month’s autumn Test series will come too soon for the big lock but he hopes to feature for Edinburgh in the first game after the international break, against Benetton at Hive Stadium on November 30.

Skinner’s right knee has been the source of his woes over the last few years and it caused him to miss the first half of last season. An operation in the summer uncovered a tear in his meniscus, the cartilage that protects the bones in the joint, and also a growth in his knee. The player thinks these issues may have been inhibiting him for a while.

“I had a fairly extensive MOT on my knee in the summer,” he explained. “I’d been carrying, in truth for a couple of seasons, a sticky knee and I just wanted to bite the bullet and get it sorted so in my head I can apply myself 100 per cent on the field rather than get through training. I spent a couple of years missing a lot of training sessions and trying to get myself out there which doesn’t really help me, or anybody else.

“They ended up finding out there was a meniscus tear that we didn’t realise, so that was one thing, I had a growth in my knee cut out which required seven incisions – a bit like taking roots out of soil – which was quite an invasive surgery, and tweaks to some ligaments. It is quite a big job but it’s gone really well.

“The growth in my knee was inhibiting movement a little bit but now I’ve heard about the meniscus, it makes a lot more sense as to why I was struggling in certain areas.”

Skinner, 29, admits it has been frustrating to watch from the sidelines but he can see a way back now and he has been keeping busy off the field. On Wednesday, he lent his support to a new initiative to help rugby clubs in Scotland have access to defibrillator machines and he also took part in a CPR demo by the side of the Murrayfield pitch.

He would rather be in the centre of the action but he knows he needs to be patient and then reproduce the kind of form that saw him selected for last year’s Rugby World Cup. Last season, he played in just two Edinburgh matches before being thrust into Scotland’s Six Nations opener against Wales. This time around he will have potentially eight games with Edinburgh before the Six Nations begins.

“That’s the target,” he said. “I played the second half of last season but I wasn’t able to perform physically. Let’s be frank, there was an injury or two in the Six Nations and I managed to be involved in all the games, but I wanted to be really knocking the door down physically so I can apply myself properly.

“Last year was a bit different, I was hungover physically from the World Cup and it was about getting fit to play, whereas this year I want to apply myself properly.”