Sione Tuipulotu on Scotland captaincy, brother's call-up and what it means for their Greenock granny

The appointment sees Townsend move away from the co-captaincy model favoured last season when Finn Russell and Rory Darge jointly held the role during the Six Nations. Russell and Darge have been named as vice-captains for the Autumn Nations Series which will see Scotland play Fiji, South Africa, Portugal and Australia next month at Murrayfield.

Townsend said he expected Tuipulotu to grow into the role and indicated that he would remain as captain beyond the autumn.

“We feel he's been a key leader for us now for the last couple of seasons,” said the coach who has named five uncapped players in his 45-man squad, including Sione’s younger brother Mosese, the Edinburgh centre. “He thrives in that leadership role. We've seen that with Glasgow, but also on the summer tour. We felt this was the right time to name one captain. Last year we wanted to grow our depth of leaders with co-captains throughout the Six Nations, and then the summer tour we had other players that got that opportunity. We still have some real strong leaders to support Sione, but we feel he's the right man right now for the team.”

Tuipulotu, 27, has been outstanding for Glasgow recently, continuing the form he showed last season as the Warriors won the United Rugby Championship. He co-captained Scotland twice on the summer tour, with Darge against the USA and with Jamie Ritchie against Chile. Townsend said he hoped that Darge’s experience of leading the team would help his development and also indicated that removing the burden from Russell would free the stand-off to concentrate on leading the attack.

“I think Rory is developing as a young player,” said the coach. “The captaincy experience was great for him. He can provide that support to Sione. In terms of Finn, I think we also are conscious that he's got a lot of responsibility in our game, and in charge of our attack, our decision-making. We want him to play his game. I think his relationship with Sione has really blossomed in the last couple of years on the field and off the field.

“I met Finn last week. I met Sione before he went out to South Africa. I know Finn connected with Sione almost straight away, so they're already talking about how that's going to work together.”

The Australian-born Tuipulotu brothers qualify for Scotland through their grandmother from Greenock, Jaqueline Thomson, and Sione said she would be proud of their achievements and that having Mosese in the squad beside him was “a fairytale”.

“The most emotional phone call I’ve ever had was Gregor phoning me to tell me I’ll be Scotland captain, but when he phoned to say my brother would be included was a pretty close second,” said Sione. “Obviously you grow up with your brothers, you see everything they’ve been through to get to this point. To be honest, it’s a fairytale to have my brother there in the squad and I’m captain. I just feel really blessed.

“He’s very similar to me. He’s the most competitive guy I’ve ever met, and I know if his number’s called upon, he will take it with both hands and he’ll play with his heart. To be honest, we always joke about this but my gran back home, her favourite’s always been Mosese! I think he was the naughtiest so he spent the most time hiding out at her house so my dad couldn’t get to him. I know my gran will be so proud of him and I’m really looking forward to getting to work with him.

“My gran always wakes up in the middle of the night and watches me and Mosese’s Glasgow and Edinburgh games, and my dad always jokes around because the next day, she always watches his games back but never the Glasgow games!”

The four other uncapped players in the squad are Edinburgh’s Freddy Douglas and Ben Muncaster and Glasgow’s Tom Jordan and Alex Samuel.