Craig Chalmers paid GROGS a great compliment by travelling from London specially to address in excess of 100 members who had gathered in the new venue of Loks Restaurant to hear one of Scotland’s rugby legends. The former Melrose, Harlequins, Scotland and British and Irish Lions player regaled the audience with stories of his playing days. He gave much of the credit for the extensive career he had enjoyed at the top levels of rugby to the incomparable Jim Telfer, coach at Melrose and later Scotland and the Lions. He firmly believes that the training methods and the rugby culture inspired by Jim Telfer led not only him to his first and subsequent caps but also the international honours gained by 7 or 8 other Melrose players of that era. He entertained us with a myriad of stories about earning his caps and his experiences with his club and international colleague, including a rather hair raising account of sharing a room with Iain (The Bear) Milne. It was commented later that this story was noticeably absent from the tales told to GROGS the time The Bear was guest speaker. Also missing from a previous guest speaker’s memories was when he (Scott Hastings), when trying to motivate the team when they were down, was the (supposed) immortal encouragement:- “Right lads, we can still do it. We can rise from the ashes like a pheasant”! We can only believe what we are told! His own stories were littered with other stories about some of Scottish Rugby’s greats and it was thrilling to hear things about some of these - an insight into their human side. When else would we hear that the great Kenny Logan thought of himself as the even greater Scottish Jonah Lomu? I wasn’t all about yesteryear, however. He had a professional opinion to express about such modern day topics as the Super Six and, of course, he had a lot of praise to offer for Gregor Townsend and the heroes on the pitch at last year’s Calcutta Cup match. All in all, the first Lunch of the 2019/20 season was deemed a great success with enthusiasm expressed for the programme to come.