Ritchie and Millar Mills out of Scotland squad after club injuries

Scotland have lost two forwards from their squad for the Nations Championship, the run of autumn internationals in which teams play each other in November. Jamie Ritchie and Elliot Millar Mills have both dropped out after getting hurt playing for their clubs at the weekend, BBC Sport reports.

Ritchie, a flanker and one of Scotland's most experienced players with 63 caps (appearances for his country), left the field with a knee injury after just 10 minutes of Glasgow Warriors' 29-20 win over the Lions. He joined Glasgow from the French club Perpignan earlier this year. Flankers are the fast, tackling loose forwards who help win the ball in the contest on the ground, known as the breakdown.

Millar Mills, a tighthead prop, was injured in the 55th minute of Newcastle Red Bulls' 59-26 defeat away to Northampton Saints. A prop is one of the big front-row forwards who anchor the scrum, the tight pack of players that restarts play after certain stoppages. He has 15 caps for Scotland.

Scotland have responded by calling up three Edinburgh players as replacements. Ollie Blyth-Lafferty, D'arcy Rae and Freddy Douglas have been named in the squad. Sale Sharks scrum-half Gus Warr, who has two caps, will also join the squad for training, along with Glasgow back Josh McKay. McKay has not yet won a cap and is still working back from a hamstring injury, the muscle at the back of the thigh.

Scotland's schedule is busy. They host New Zealand on 7 November, face Australia eight days later, and finish the window against Japan on 21 November. Each of those games will test the squad's depth, and the new arrivals will have little time to settle in.

Injuries like these are a constant part of the Nations Championship. Players are often asked to give everything for their clubs in the weeks before international duty, and the squad cannot wait for them. For the players involved, the disappointment is obvious, but so is the need for the replacements to step up quickly.

Front-row forwards like Millar Mills are not easy to replace at short notice, because the scrum relies on a settled partnership. Ritchie's work at the breakdown is similarly hard to copy. Scotland now have to find those answers in training, before the first whistle against the All Blacks on 7 November.