Why Edinburgh and Glasgow will have to make do without Scotland internationals for over half a season

There are many more tries regularly scored at all levels of the game now, not least Argentina's big win against Australia last weekend – 67-27, which is the sort of score you used to get only in festive friendlies or in ill-matched World Cup pool games.

Australia now have two Tests against the All Blacks, who will be looking to put their two losses to South Africa behind them. It should make for a lively November.

The outlook for Australia looks gloomy. They must surely improve before meeting the Lions next summer. Otherwise it could be very embarrassing. At least they now have a very good coach in Joe Schmidt.

They have the Autumn internationals in the northern hemisphere, a chance to take a grip. One of these is, of course, at Murrayfield, and it will be very disappointing if Scotland can't win that match, even handsomely. On paper, the Scots’ hardest match in November should be the one against Argentina, arguably good enough at present to be ranked fifth in the world behind South Africa, Ireland, New Zealand and France.

That said, this is going to be an arduous season, both physically and mentally. Scotland will have played nine internationals by the end of March, equivalent to two seasons in the old days.

Meanwhile, the club pro season is very demanding. The URC and European competitions will call on reserves of strength at both Glasgow and Edinburgh. The URC is a more punishing league than the English Premiership. Not only are there more matches, there being more clubs in the URC, but the travel between here and South Africa also takes a toll.

This is going to put great stress on players and coaches, especially when you remember that Scotland head coach Gregor Townsend will not only have first call on players for international duty, but is quite rightly entitled to restrict their availability to the clubs. Last season Glasgow head coach Franco Smith managed his squad brilliantly. This year may be even more difficult.

It is now being recommended in some quarters that players should be restricted to a maximum of 30 matches per season – even perhaps per year if summer tours are counted. On health and safety grounds this seems right. All the medical evidence suggests that injuries, especially injuries to the head, require to be followed by a period of inactivity, rest and recuperation.

As far as I see, the 30-match maximum doesn't take heed of the number of hours on the field, though it would seem that it might reasonably take this into account. Be that as it may, it is clear that with nine internationals, four of them in November, five in the Six Nations, few of the core national team will be available to their club coach for even half the club commitments. This, of course, is not taking into account periods when players are injured or in recovery, the only exceptions to this being, I guess, those who play their club rugby in England (like Finn Russell, for instance) or France (like Blair Kinghorn).

Player management for club and national coaches becomes more difficult every year. It seems, for instance, unlikely that many of the established Scotland squad who went on the summer tour of the Americas will be ready for Glasgow or Edinburgh before the second week in October, and will then be very quickly whisked away in preparation for the November internationals.

Coaches will have to be skilful jugglers as the season progresses.