Scotland fly-half Finn Russell has said that his feud with head coach Gregor Townsend, which kept him out of this year's Six Nations, was blown "out of proportion."
The Racing 92 fly-half left Scotland's training camp for disciplinary reasons a week prior to their Six Nations opener against Ireland after he breached team protocol during a pre-tournament training camp in Edinburgh.
Adam Hastings replaced Russell at fly-half for the tournament and led Scotland to two victories, including a thumping 28-17 win over France last month to end their opponent's hope of completing a Grand Slam.
Russell said that he hopes to be back in Townsend's plans for the side's international Test against South Africa and New Zealand in July.
"It's not like there was a massive disagreement where I was saying 'I'll never play for you again,'" Russell told BT Sport. "That's the target we've both got, to be on the same page, working better together. Not better than it is now, but better than it ever has been.
"When I spoke to Gregor before the France game, I said to him it's not the right time for me to come back in.
"I said we'll work on it after the Six Nations, and we were speaking about the tour to South Africa and New Zealand.
"That's the plan, to build the relationship up as well as we can and then we can get going in the summer."
Russell played no part in this year's Championship, with the player returning to his home club in France shortly after he was dismissed from the squad.
Scotland sat in third place in the Six Nations after four games before their final match against Wales at the Principality Stadium was postponed indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic. Three other fixtures in this year's Championship were also postponed.
