As a club of rugby enthusiasts, GROGS was honoured when Franco Smith, current Head Coach of Glasgow Warriors, and former Head Coach of the Italian national team, agreed to be our guest speaker for October. It went beyond an honour for the 111 GROGs present to listen to one of the top exponents of coaching in world rugby today and to hear his thoughts in these interesting times. Following a very full and well researched introduction by Chairman, Hugh Dan MacLennan, the preferred format of the day, a Question and Answer session, got off to a fun start when Franco apologised lest his South African accent made it difficult to follow what he was saying. To a room full of hearing aids this was the least of the problems! In the event, he was heard and understood loud and clear. There were some who wondered about the value of a Q & A format but the quality of the questions both from the Chairman and the floor and the depth and detail of the answers eased any doubts. Franco didn’t spend much time talking about his playing career but concentrated on describing his development in the coaching side of the game and his progress to becoming Head Coach of Glasgow Warriors. For some reason it seems that he wanted to come to Glasgow! He explained that the mission he brought to Warriors is “not to lose” and described how he introduced the novel approach of the players becoming shareholders of the club. In listening to his straight answers to some well-directed questions we realised we were being given an insight into a hitherto unfamiliar level of top club rugby. The technicalities and strategies of the modern game might have been a bit bewildering to some of the gathered stars of yesteryear but, by and large, we got the gist of what Franco was saying. Although we ran a bit over time no-one seemed to notice, or care. His address ended with some very diplomatic answers about his forecast for the outcome of the World Cup and the standard of refereeing at it. Franco is a man with an easy outgoing demeanour who well deserved the standing ovation and the presentation bottle of Special GROGS whisky he received.