Blair Kinghorn’s move to French giants Toulouse is set to be confirmed in the coming days, with the Scotland full-back’s departure from Edinburgh possibly happening with immediate effect.
The 26-year-old is contracted to the capital club until the end of the season, but French sources have suggested that Toulouse want him to join immediately as a replacement for France international Melvyn Jaminet, whose move to their rivals and near-namesakes Toulon was recently confirmed by both clubs.
Edinburgh declined to say anything about the possible loss of one of their most important players, other than to offer the usual refusal to comment on “rumour and speculation”. In France, however, Kinghorn’s departure from his only club to date has been seen as a fait accompli rather than a hypothesis for some time.
Respected newspaper Midi Olympique first reported the news two weeks ago, when his destination was expected to be Toulon. But that was before the current Europe Challenge Cup holders decided to bid for Jaminet instead - a decision which had the knock-on effect of igniting Toulouse’s interest in Kinghorn.
If Edinburgh do lose Kinghorn immediately, their back-three resources will be stretched in the short term at least, with both Darcy Graham and Emiliano Boffelli currently out injured. However, right-winger Graham is expected to be back in a week or two, and once he returns, Wes Goosen would be free to take over at full-back.
Stand-off Cammy Scott could also fill in at No 15 until the return of Boffelli, who is due back at some point next month. Even so, there is no denying that Kinghorn, who has made 137 appearances for Edinburgh to date and has played 50 times for his country, would be a substantial loss.
In theory, Edinburgh could play hardball and refuse any request from Toulouse for Kinghorn to be released immediately. In practice, it is more likely that a compensation fee would be agreed - as happened earlier this year when Glasgow Warriors allowed stand-off Domingo Miotti to leave them just a month after signing a new contract in order to join another French club, Oyonnax.
Edinburgh have enjoyed a promising start to their URC campaign, winning four of their opening five fixtures. Their next game is at home tomorrow night against Benetton, who were unbeaten until last week, when they lost to Glasgow at Scotstoun.
“The positive thing about the way we’ve started is that every week we’ve felt like we’ve not played at our best,” lock forward Grant Gilchrist said. “That’s a sign of a good team, that we’ve learned how to win these tight games.
“We’ve got better week on week, but we’ve not quite hit our potential yet. I hope that continues for a long time, because our mindset is we just want to keep getting better week on week.
“When you look around the training pitch and the quality of squad we have, there’s nobody we should be fearing. When we click at our very best, we can beat anyone on our day.
“We’re not losing sight of the fact we’ve got a lot of work to do, because when we look at the games we’ve played already, they were games that shouldn’t have been close if we’d played at our best. We should have won by a bigger margin.
“But I’ve been loving it. It’s been great getting back in with the boys after being away for such a long time [at the Rugby World Cup]. I’ve loved being back playing here, the last couple of weekends especially with big crowds.”
Gilchrist turned 33 in August, but insisted he had given no thought to international retirement. “I’m not going to step away,” he said.
“I’ve not been good enough at times in my career to play for Scotland. It’s about being on form and good enough to play. If I’m good enough to play, I want to play.
“I love playing for Scotland. It’s up to the coaches to pick the team, and at times you might not be selected. But I’ll certainly be putting up my hand and trying my best week in, week out to get results for Edinburgh, making sure I’m playing my best rugby so I can put my hand up for national selection as well.”
