Scots stun Ireland and England win ‘ugly’ as Six Nations opens
SCOTLAND head coach Vern Cotter believes his team’s thrilling 27-22 opening day win at home to stun prechampionship favourites Ireland has “changed the dynamics” of their Six Nations campaign.
Having let slip a 21-5 lead to trail Ireland 22-21 midway through the second half, two penalties in the last eight minutes by captain Greig Laidlaw secured Scotland’s first victory in an opening Six Nations fixture since they beat France at Murrayfield in 2006 – potentially putting them in contention for their first Championship title in 18 years.
“It certainly changes the dynamic,” said Cotter, who is aiming to finish his three-year tenure on a high before making way for Glasgow coach Gregor Townsend in June. “You can feel it. You start the Six Nations with a win and everybody speaks about it.
“But it’s only one game. I know the feet will be on the ground very quickly come Monday morning, just to make sure we back this up with another good performance.”
Next up for Cotter’s side are France away on Sunday, and Scotland have not won in Paris since 1999, when Gregor Townsend inspired them to their last Championship success, in the final year of the Five Nations.
They will certainly travel with renewed confidence, having rocked Ireland, who beat the All Blacks in November, with a dynamic first-half performance that yielded two tries for the brilliant full back Stuart Hogg and a cunning score directly from a line out by centre Alex Dunbar.
“The last time we were in Paris we were close to winning,” said Laidlaw, referring to a 19-16 loss in a World Cup warm up in September 2015.
“We can take heart out of that and I think we’ve moved forward even since then. We’ll enjoy this tonight quaich and we’ll get our feet back on the ground tomorrow morning. We’ll not get ahead of ourselves.”
Asked if Scotland’s target for the championship had been changed by the victory, Laidlaw (who returned a perfect place-kicking record, with three conversions and two penalties) replied: “We want to win the next game. If we win the next game, we’ll be in a good position.”
Laidlaw will head to the Stade de France with added personal incentive – he moves from Gloucester to Clermont at the end of the season.
Cotter will also join a French Top 14 side – Montpellier – but for the time being the New Zealander is savouring his first win over Ireland coach Joe Schmidt, his former assis- tant at Bay of Plenty and Clermont.
Asked whether the victory was the best of his international stint with Scotland, Cotter said: “It has to be.”
In contrast, Schmidt was lamenting a false start that might cost his team dearly in the Championship race.
“We arrived 15 minutes late and we were late for all things in that first half,” said Schmidt. “We were sluggish. The key thing is we’ve got to start better in Rome next week. Defeat is tough to take but it was always potentially a reality coming here.
“The Championship looks tough to win but we’re not out of it. We backed up with a bonus point and we’ve got to go to Italy and make it six points and make sure we’ve got some momentum in this Championship.”
Although a try and conversion by stand-in stand-off Paddy Jackson put Ireland ahead – following tries by winger Keith Earls and lock Iain Henderson – Schmidt’s side sorely missed the orchestrating of the injured Jonathan Sexton.
“Jonny could come into it for next week but the more time Paddy gets in the Six Nations the better he’ll be,” Schmidt said.
‘Beautiful’ result for Jones
England coach Eddie Jones said his side had produced an “ugly” performance but a “beautiful” result after his reigning champions edged France 19-16 in their Six Nations opener at Twickenham on Saturday.
Victory saw England keep alive their hope of back-to-back Grand Slams as they posted a new national record 15th win in a row.
But a scrappy and error-strewn England were still in danger of defeat until replacement back Ben Te’o’s first Test try nine minutes from time sealed a come-from-behind win.
“Sometimes these things happen, it is a game of rugby and there are humans involved,” Jones told ITV.
“We made some silly handling errors, but we have some great finishers on the bench, we got really good value from them,” added the Australian, who has won all 14 of his game in charge of England since taking over after the side crashed out in the first round of the 2015 World Cup on home soil.
In addition to Auckland-born Te’o’s try, Owen Farrell kicked 11 points, with England’s other score a 48-metre penalty from long-range kick specialist Elliot Daly – recalled by Jones for his first Test since being sent off against Argentina in November.
“The good thing for us is that we can shift around with Elliot Daly and Ben Te’o giving the French something different to look at in the centres,” said Jones.
“The performance was ugly, but the result is beautiful.”
England captain Dylan Hartley, after his first match in six weeks since suspension, admitted the champions had reason to thank their bench.
“Ben Te’o and James Haskell came on and gave us a good bit going forward at the end there, so unbelievable impact from our subs,” said Hartley. “We dug in, we found a way and we’ll take something from that.”
Next up for England, who will break world champions New Zealand’s tier one record of 18 consecutive Test wins with another Grand Slam, is a match away to Wales on February 11.