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Speaking in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires on Thursday, Steve Tandy claimed that changing his fly-half for their Nations Championship clash wouldn’t fundamentally change how they looked to attack Los Pumas in San Juan.
That may be true on the most part, but there’s bound to be little differences between the two. Earlier this week, former Wales scrum-half Richie Rees – an adept analyst of the modern game – noted briefly how the pair differ.
“Sam gives you something different to Dan,” said Rees on the Scrum V podcast. “Dan plays what he sees a little but more, whereas Sam is a little bit more controlled and experienced in the game. His kicking game when he came on the field.
“Dan missed the posts a couple of times and then when he went to the corner, he maybe put it 15 metres out. If that’s five metres from the line, it’s a completely different lineout call.
“When Sam came on the field, he managed the game well and those kicks to the corner, we scored two tries from them.”
It’s hard to escape, whether Wales say it or not, that the fundamental reason behind Costelow’s chance in the 10 jersey this weekend lies behind the structure he brings to the Welsh team.
Edwards didn’t enjoy his finest game against Fiji last Saturday. He was physically battered by an aggressive defence and his kicking probably suffered as a result.
A week out of the firing line, as much as the Ospreys man would have been dying to get back on the saddle, isn’t a bad thing.
Edwards is still a fine fly-half, particularly in the red-zone where his eye for a tryline shines through.
But, much like Wales did in Costelow’s last start under Tandy against Scotland in the Six Nations, you sense they’ll want to play more than they managed against Fiji.
Wales’ backs had little to do in the first-half in Cardiff on the weekend, rarely going through the phases. When they did, they left themselves vulnerable to Fiji’s breakdown abilities.
Looking at how Scotland went after Argentina, playing to the wide channels to find linebreak opportunities, Wales’ attack is going to be more involved this week – as daft as that might sound the week after Wales scored six tries in a match for the first time since 2021.
Expect Wales to try to break down Argentina’s defence in between the 15-metre lines early and often on Saturday – just as they did in Costelow’s other start against Scotland.
That day, Wales set out their stall from their first attacking set.
From a lineout that day, they had plenty of options to keep Scotland’s defence from flying up.
Then, on the next two phases, they ran the sort of shape that we’re starting to see on a regular basis with Wales. One forward runs an unders line off the nine as a viable option, with a bank of forwards sweeping around behind.
Coincidentally, Edwards’ first try against the Barbarians the other week came from Wainwright carrying powerfully using the same shape. It’s textbook Matt Sherratt, not too dissimilar from what you’d see in rugby league.
However, what really helps Wales steal metres is Costelow calling for the ball out the back before firing a pass to Louis Rees-Zammit. If there are some differences between Wales’ two fly-halves, then the way Costelow stays attached to his pod is clearly a strength.
“Sam was out the back of things going forward and you can see the game a lot more clearly,” said Sherratt about this attacking set back in the Six Nations. “What I was really pleased was Sam was brave.
“It’s very easy just to let a game happen sometimes, especially in the early stages. What Sam did really well is if it was 50-50 to call for a ball out the back and we were 3v3 on an edge, he went for it.”
Having reached one edge, Wales moved it to the other – with Costelow and Eddie James working as those options behind the pod of forwards. They don’t use it that time, with Taine Plumtree instead making metres.
With Scotland’s defence retreating, Wales shift the ball wide – James acts as a second-receiver – with Josh Adams and Gabriel Hamer-Webb working across to link the play.
Wales will feel confident that, especially with some other nuances like forwards tipping on, that Costelow has the ball-playing ability to get his side into those wider channels where they might be able to create mismatches.
Ellis Mee had a couple of tries ruled out against the Barbarians last month – but the first was just typical of Costelow’s work in structured play.
That’s the key – structured play. Wales will look to stretch Argentina, but they won’t go crazy with ball in hand.
“There was a lot of transition,” said Tandy about last week’s win over Fiji. “Hopefully we’ll have some more opportunities to string some more phase attack together but we won’t go away from how we play.
“We’ve got our game model as we saw during the Six Nations. The Fiji game definitely broke out but we got it back to certain parts of structure.
“But there will probably need to be more of an all-round game to really test Argentina on the weekend.”
When it’s time to kick, Costelow will kick. Hopefully, if Wales’ game model is working well, it’ll be off the front-foot.
