Why a fit and firing Harry Paterson can be a huge asset for Edinburgh Rugby this season

The mid-season departure of Blair Kinghorn and the loss through injury of Darcy Graham, Emiliano Boffelli and Wes Goosen conspired to strip the squad of much of its attacking intent. But it was the absence of the less celebrated Harry Paterson that is often overlooked.

Paterson, 23, is the local boy made good who was catapulted into the spotlight by his late inclusion in the Scotland team to play France in February in what turned out to be a Murrayfield nailbiter. Having been a surprise inclusion in Gregor Townsend’s initial Six Nations squad - he’d started just seven matches for Edinburgh prior to his call-up - he was then thrust into the 15 jersey on the morning of the France game after Kyle Steyn’s partner went into labour.

Paterson was outstanding in a match Scotland lost in agonising fashion when Sam Skinner’s late ‘try’ was not awarded after a seemingly interminable TMO review. Townsend later called the full-back’s performance one of the best international debuts he’d ever seen.

Things looked bright for the player but he was to play only two more games for Edinburgh before injuries ruled him out of the remainder of the campaign.

How Edinburgh would have loved to have been able to call upon the gifted Paterson as their more established wings and full-backs fell by the wayside. Instead, coach Sean Everitt had little option but to push square pegs into round holes, with centre Matt Currie redeployed in the wing during the run-in and then another centre, James Lang, drafted in at full-back for the final must-win game against Benetton in Italy which ended in a dispiriting defeat.

Happily for Paterson, he was able to recover in time for Scotland’s summer tour and made his comeback in the opener against Canada, turning in a man-of-the-match performance and scoring his first Test try in the 73-12 win in Ontario.

“I hadn’t really played for a while - the Canada game was my first game since the middle of the Six Nations, so I was kind of just trying to get back into the swing of things,” he reflected. “We seemed to click that day, so it was quite a good game to maybe get back into. We got a lot of ball, and we had a real crack, so it was quite fun that game.

“A lot of gaps opened up, which was nice. And it was a pretty chaotic game. I went off for a blood thing and for the first five minutes when I came back on, I couldn't really see properly. It was just because it was all being stitched up. If they had put the high ball up on me, I would have been pretty screwed there, but it was alright for the rest of the game, and we managed to get some points on the board. It was a great day - absolutely roasting though!”

The facial injury sustained against the Canadians kept him out for the matches against USA and Chile but he came back into the squad for the final game against Uruguay and played the full 80 minutes as Scotland won 31-19 to make it four tour wins from four.

After an injury-interrupted season in which he started just five matches for Edinburgh and three for Scotland, Paterson is now looking to kick on. Pre-season has been good and the full-back is preparing for Edinburgh’s first (and only) warm-up fixture, against Gloucester at Hive Stadium a week on Friday, followed by the URC opener at home to Leinster a week later. Edinburgh then head to South Africa to take on the Bulls and Lions as they look to make amends for last season’s disappointment. The final-day defeat by Benetton condemned them to a 10th-placed finish and the hope this season is that with the addition of new signings such as Paul Hill, Magnus Bradbury, Matt Scott, Mosese Tuipulotu, Ross Thompson and Ross McCann, Edinburgh can make the play-offs.

“We’re feeling good,” said Paterson. “We’ve had time off, we’ve got a couple of weeks under our belt now and we're pushing towards that Gloucester pre-season game, and then Leinster week one, which is massive. Everything is geared towards that.

“The squad’s so competitive at the moment: most of the boys are fit, there aren’t many injuries and especially in my position, there's a lot of competition, which gets everyone better.”

The return to fitness of Graham and Boffelli is especially pleasing and although Paterson acknowledges that it will be tougher to force his way into the team, he is grateful for their advice.

“They've always been great with me,” he said. “I think we're just all trying to push each other. I’ve always tried to learn from them a lot. Darcy’s hard to learn from because he’s just so unique and it’s hard to learn that. Ultimately, realistically, I probably won’t be able to do what he does. In fact, I definitely won’t be able to do what he does. But being able to take little things and add them to your game, that's what you can really try to do.”

Keeping their big guns fit could be key to Edinburgh’s success or otherwise this year, particularly in the back three, and Paterson could have a big role to play. This time last year he was a promising player on the periphery. Now he’s a fully fledged international and hopes he and his team-mates can have an injury-free run as they push for the play-offs.

“At the start of [last] season, it was like, where am I going to get a game here?” he said. “There’s so much depth. But then, we just got loads of injuries in the back three. That was obviously challenging for the club. Some of the guys, especially Matt [Currie], went on to the wing and did a really good job. Hopefully, we won't have to make boys play out of position too much this year.”

• Harry Paterson is supporting the world’s oldest varsity match between University of Edinburgh and St Andrews University. The match takes place at Edinburgh Rugby’s Hive Stadium on Saturday 21 September (kick-off 2pm) and tickets are available from £10 via scottishvarsitymatch.com