Gregor Townsend was always fond of a curveball. When the time came to unveil his training squads, you could count on the coach to pluck a Scottish-qualified rabbit from his hat; a name so far from left-field it was practically out of the ballpark entirely.

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Along with Gav Vaughan, his analyst, scout, confidant and occasional genealogist, Townsend would unearth a father from Dumfries or a granny from Aberdeenshire and the press pack would be stunned. Nobody saw Luke Hamilton, the Leicester Tigers back-row, coming way back in 2017. Blade Thomson, the loping Kiwi at the Scarlets, attracted much fanfare. Dylan Richardson was down in Durban with the Sharks. Alec Hepburn, a double winner with Exeter who’d been born in Australia and won caps for England.

It’s a far straighter selectorial bat these days. Less than a year from the World Cup, the ‘Toony Tombola’ gathers dust. Townsend has a dozen Tests before the curtain-raiser against Uruguay in Melbourne on 3^rd October. This is a period for fine-tuning, strengthening bonds, calcifying cohesion, layering details onto a game plan, not ripping up the blueprint and tossing in new players.

There were some headline omissions, though, from Monday’s squad. Grant Gilchrist has only just returned from an arm injury but the veteran lock will come into the reckoning for the Six Nations. Cam Henderson, in the same position, has been a brilliant soldier at Leicester without ever becoming part of Townsend’s inner circle.

Magnus Bradbury tops the URC carry charts from No 8 but the Edinburgh captain is out too. Townsend wants to see more from him than his use of the bludgeon. Adam Hastings played superbly for Montpellier against Finn Russell’s Bath but Fergus Burke and Tom Jordan remain ahead of him. Josh McKay does not fulfil his residency conditions until the third game of November so he may be a later addition. The Glasgow rapier has been Scottish rugby’s form full-back of the past two seasons. His involvement feels like a case of ‘when’ not ‘if’.

In the early throes of the URC, Scotland’s ‘Yung Teem’ have been running amok. Edinburgh are top of the league fielding a squad laced with youth while Glasgow are hot on their heels with the usual blend of front-line internationals and emerging talent. So far, it is a trippy form of utopia.

Scottish Rugby has completely remodelled its player pathways and tightened overseas recruitment to get these players game-ready quicker, and in greater numbers. The signs are hugely encouraging. Yet for all the promise, this squad was never going to be stacked with the tyros making a name for themselves. Liam McConnell is too precocious and too consistent to leave out. Seb Stephen is the coming man at hooker with a unique physical profile. In almost every other position, the competition is too fierce and the men Townsend has trusted and developed for years hold the high ground.

Ollie Blyth-Lafferty is a more notable casualty. Tighthead prop is Scotland’s most vulnerable position and the 20-year-old has shown tantalising glimpses of heft and dominance in the set-piece.

Hector Patterson has many admirers but has only played 633 minutes of elite men’s rugby. He was never going to usurp Ben White, Jamie Dobie or George Horne, unless Townsend plans to use Dobie as a starting wing and select a fourth scrum-half. The same goes for Fergus Watson, the muscular wing, and Macenzzie Duncan, the impressive back-row, at Glasgow.

Ollie Blyth-Lafferty is a more notable casualty. Tighthead prop is Scotland’s most vulnerable position and the 20-year-old has shown tantalising glimpses of heft and dominance in the set-piece. Scotland grows props of 6ft 4ins and 135kg about as often as it grows palm trees. On the basis an injury to Zander Fagerson is as damaging as one to Finn Russell, capping the young beast now, and giving him a shot at making a run for Australia, was a popular idea.

Blyth-Lafferty has work to do, though. A former coach once said “Ollie has to get excited about more than scrummaging” which is a sentiment that will resonate with Townsend. Blyth-Lafferty acknowledges he needs to move all that body mass with greater venom and harness its blunt-force-trauma potential. He has a higher ceiling than Will Hurd or Elliot Millar Mills, who are selected ahead of him, but those two have years of Gallagher Prem experience and credit in the bank. Murray McCallum is still a worthy alternative when he regains match fitness at Newcastle. Blyth-Lafferty’s time will come.

Freddy Douglas is the most eyebrow-raising absentee. Nobody in world rugby makes jackal steals at the same rate as the Edinburgh poacher. Douglas has been recovering from concussion and missed Friday’s win over the Lions, but it’s still a jolt to see his name missing from the list.

Like Blyth-Lafferty, Douglas has been challenged not to become a single-skilled player. Sean Everitt kept him out of the opening block of Edinburgh games last season until he’d worked on his collision dominance and game awareness. Townsend will want to see similar progress, despite his URC-best eight turnovers in just three matches. For an inexperienced professional, the identification and timing of his jackals are generally on the money. He did, however, get himself whistled off the park in failing to adapt to Eoghan Cross’ refereeing against the Stormers. Townsend will have taken note. Penalties equal 22 access, 22 access equals mauls, and mauls, under the current laws of the game, are fiendishly hard to stop.

Yet Douglas’ USP is so compelling, his exclusion feels risky. Whatever his carrying, or his wider ‘rugby IQ’, he’d have been an awesome weapon to wield from a six-two bench against the All Blacks. When the game is tight, the tension unbearable, and Scotland are coming under fire, unleashing Douglas on the New Zealand breakdown could have snatched vital momentum through steals and penalties.

You can see Townsend’s train of thought. Jamie Ritchie, likely to fulfil that role, is vastly experienced, back from injury and a more rounded back-row forward than Douglas. Josh Bayliss provides a different skillset again from the pine and showed up terrifically in July.

In Douglas’ place is Ollie Leatherbarrow. Not exactly like for like, though the Newcastle breakaway first emerged as a seven. Leatherbarrow has been a ray of light in these darkest of seasons for the artist formerly known as the Falcons. Ultra-aggressive and brilliantly cussed on both sides of the ball, he has been deployed regularly at No 8, can play across the back-row and in the new and exhilarating Red Bull era, often adds punch in the final 30 from the bench. Last season, Leatherbarrow averaged 13 carries, three tackle-breaks and 12 tackles per match in a meagrely resourced and massively underpowered Newcastle side. He’s a worth a look, for sure, and might get a cap against Japan in the penultimate fixture.

Huw Jones was sidelined last November and for all Rory Hutchinson’s many talents, his synergy with Russell and Sione Tuipulotu, plus those devastating running angles, give Scotland a precious boost.

What of those returning to the fray? To label Duhan van der Merwe a ‘surprise call-up’ as recently as a year ago would be grounds for an immediate breathalyser test, but the big man has endured a wretched time of it. Memorably dropped for the All Blacks game last November – effectively the first time in his Scotland career he was not picked when available – he has been stricken by injury and desperately short of form. His comeback from a long-standing ankle problem on Friday lasted just 18 minutes before the luckless wing was invalided out with a cut hand. Once among the prime attacking threats in Europe, Van der Merwe must prove he is not a fading force.

Darcy Graham is likely to start the New Zealand opener on one wing with the imperious Kyle Steyn on the other and Dobie backing them up as the utility back on the bench. Graham’s speedier than anticipated comeback from an arm injury offers Townsend a different attacking profile. Steyn is simply majestic and Dobie playing rugby from the Gods. Blair Kinghorn is back from injury with Toulouse. If he can rediscover his best rugby, he’ll be a huge asset.

Huw Jones was sidelined last November and for all Rory Hutchinson’s many talents, his synergy with Russell and Sione Tuipulotu, plus those devastating running angles, give Scotland a precious boost. Russell, at 34, has a ravenous desire to break more barriers and deliver silverware reflective of his talent before his Test career is done. Tuipulotu’s form remains at a world-class level. That’s the front-line midfield, no question.

Townsend has always been a coach with broad horizons, keen to innovate and utilise nous from other environments. He’s had Justin Longmuir, the Freemantle AFL coach, in to help Scotland improve on the aerial game which is the staple of Aussie Rules and has become so pivotal to winning modern rugby matches.

Townsend has also been frustrated by the international calendars of the past. Too often, his team were deprived of the chance to face the southern hemisphere’s ultimate tests, the Springboks and the All Blacks, in the July and November windows. The Nations Championship changes that. It guarantees regular assaults on the game’s thought leaders and with it, a more realistic chance of smashing the New Zealand hoodoo his players came painfully close to breaking in 2025 and 2017.

Near misses now are no good, though. Scotland have had too many of those. They need to prove the concept, to go into a World Cup knowing they have scaled the All Black mountain, grappled with the Bokke on the Highveld, and finally slain the Irish dragon which has tormented them for a decade. The youngsters hammering at the door will have their time. They will own the next World Cup cycle, in all probability under a new coaching regime. In the here and now, Townsend is doubling down.