article: Sitting in an urban utopia - a sky garden overlooking Hong Lim Park, surrounded by hanging vines, infinity pools, pavilions shaped like giant birdcages and 15,000 square metres of greenery - Townsend announced his line-up to face Italy at the air-cooled indoor national stadium on Saturday amid an architectural wonder. What Townsend is about to build on the rugby field is unknown, but this was the first stop. In the absence of Richie Gray through injury and his brother Jonny, who sits out Saturday's Test but will feature against the Wallabies next weekend, he has a new second-row partnership. Glasgow's Tim Swinson and Ben Toolis, the Edinburgh lock being one of the few who managed to rise above the team's malaise in the season just gone, pair up in the engine room. "Ben gets his reward for the form he's been in with Edinburgh," said Townsend. "His work-rate, his physicality, his athleticism is really good and it gives Jonny the chance to get up to full match fitness." This will be Toolis' second cap and his first start. His one and only cap lasted just eight minutes off the bench in a game that has gone down as one of the most painful in recent years, for Scotland as a collective and for Toolis as an individual. It was February 2015 and the lock replaced his Saturday partner, Swinson, after 69 minutes of the Six Nations game with Italy at Murrayfield. Scotland were ahead 19-15 at the time. In the 77th minute, Toolis got sin-binned and the Scots ended up losing the game in what was arguably the low point of Vern Cotter's time in charge. Toolis hasn't played a Test since. Against the same opposition in Singapore, Toolis has a shot at changing his Scotland story. With Stuart Hogg and Tommy Seymour away with the Lions, Townsend has converted Duncan Taylor into a full-back and, on the wing, he gives Damien Hoyland his first cap since last summer. It will be Hoyland's second start for Scotland in what will be his third cap. His debut was also against Italy in August 2015. WP Nel returns at tight-head after the most frustrating injury-plagued year of his career, the same going for Taylor who has not played for his country in 12 months, a period that he described last week as a "mental battle". The Saracen had two different hamstring injuries that put him out for two months, two operations on his ankle that cost him four months, a head injury that kept him out four weeks, then shoulder damage that had him in treatment for another four. He made it back in time for Saracens' Champions Cup retention, appearing as a second-half substitute. Josh Strauss also comes into the side after being invalided out of the Six Nations in France while at the peak of his powers. Townsend joked that, in the searing humidity in training, his players have been using Strauss' magnificent beard - in its own way a fabulous creation to rival anything on the Singapore skyline - as a
summary: As settings go, the roof of the Scotland team hotel in downtown Singapore wasn't the worst place for Gregor Townsend to name his first team as coach of the national side.