HANG YOUR HEADS IN SHAME
Embarrassment for Scots after they capitulate to Ireland with barely a whimper
FIRST, there was all the excitement of the World Cup build-up. Then, as the match approached, the growing expectation of a famous Scottish victory. What followed, however, was nothing short of a debacle.
In the list of anti-climatic, horrendous Scotland performances — and there have been many — this was up there with the worst of them. Slow to start, second best in every department, like rabbits caught in headlights at times. It was an embarrassment of the highest degree.
Just what had the Scotland coaches been doing all summer? It certainly wasn’t firing up their players who didn’t offer up anything against the Irish here yesterday.
Basic errors, balls dropped, passes missed... the charge sheet goes on.
In a desperate search for positives one could possibly give Stuart Hogg and Grant Gilchrist credit for effort. The rest of their misfiring team-mates will be doing an awful lot of soul-searching over the coming days.
Pulling on the jersey is all well and good. But you have to honour it by giving your all. Can some Scotland players honestly say they weren’t posted missing when their country needed them? Was it too much to expect them to make a fight of it?
Where was the desire, the grit and determination that so exemplifies previous Scotland teams? Where were the David Sole type leaders? The hard, wee front row nuggets like Allan Chunk Jacobsen? The enforcers like Jim Hamilton?
Of the current crop, Jonny Gray was pushed around far too easily. Ryan Wilson failed to live-up to his pre-match talk. WP Nel, for so long the cornerstone of the Scottish scrum, crumbled. Even Finn Russell failed miserably.
In the Scotland coaching box, where was the tactical genius of a Jim Telfer or a Sir Ian McGeechan to change things around? Gregor Townsend doesn’t seem to have a plan B when things are going wrong.
He wants Scotland to play the fastest rugby in the world to run the opposition off their feet. As exasperated Scotland 1990 Grand Slam legend Scott Hastings commented afterwards: ‘That’s all well and good if you have the all-round skills of the All Blacks to play that way, but we certainly aren’t the All Blacks’.
The warning signs were there before kick-off with the stadium bathed in green. Even off the park Scotland were outnumbered. Organisers tried to get the 1,000 or so Scotland fans into the spirit of things by playing The Proclaimers’ 500 Miles time and time again. Not surprisingly it barely raised a murmur and by the end of the game only the hardiest of Scottish souls remained to hear the final whistle.
Indeed, the only time Scotland looked really up for the fight was during the anthems. Gilchrist and Hogg both looked like they were in tears as Flower of Scotland was played. Emotions perhaps were getting the better of them.
So the stage was set, the time had come. But when the curtains opened it was 80 minutes of, well, nothing from a Scotland point of view.
From the off they were third best. Townsend continually talks of the need for his team to make fast starts but once again here were his men coughing up early scores.
It took just five minutes for the Irish to go in front in simple fashion. It is tough to stop Iain Henderson but not impossible.
Scotland captain Stuart McInally made it look harder than it is after being brushed aside by him far too easily.
A few more attacking phases, poor Scotland defending and up popped James Ryan to get over the line. Ireland fly-half Johnny Sexton, the player Townsend’s team boasted they were going to ‘smash’, put over the conversion.
Say what you like about Ireland captain Rory Best but you can’t doubt his leadership skills and sheer bloody-minded determination. An odd throw-in of his may go a bit squint but when the 37-year-old is on form with his arrows it is bullseye every time.
He found Henderson in the lineout, got in behind the forwards and showed great courage and determination to twist his body to somehow touch the ball down amid a sea of bodies. Scotland were 12-0 down after just 13 minutes.
Greig Laidlaw put over a penalty with customary aplomb on the 20-minute mark, but that was the start and end of Scotland’s points scoring. From then on in things went from bad to worse.
The Irish hacked downfield with Hogg doing well to save the situation by touching down behind his own line. Ireland got the scrum, man of the match CJ Stander went
from the base and Tadhg Furlong went over. Far too easy. With Conor Murray’s conversion, the score went up to 19-3 and Ireland were already out of sight.
Three minutes before the break, more bad news as Scotland lost Hamish Watson to injury. It looked like his knee and although he returned to sit on the bench for the rest of the game his chances of appearing in the World Cup again will depend on a scan today.
Fraser Brown, technically reserve hooker, came on in his place. That was a real slap in the face to back-row forward Blade Thomson who was stripped and ready to come on before Townsend changed his mind.
Ireland’s next try came in 55 minutes after Wilson made a hash of trying to gather a box kick by Murray. To be fair he wasn’t the first and certainly wasn’t the last to fumble a ball in Scotland colours over this horrific encounter.
Ireland full-back Jordan Larmour picked up, played it back inside to Murray and winger Andrew Conway skipped his way past a missing Scotland defence for a try. It was the perfect moment to take off playmaker Sexton. So in control were Ireland they could rest their key assets. It was humiliating.
Replacement Jack Carty kept the scoreboard ticking over by putting over a penalty with 13 minutes left as Ireland ran down the clock.
Joe Schmidt’s side were reduced to 14 players in 69 minutes when Tadhg Beirne was sin-binned for killing the ball, but even that didn’t make a difference. Scotland still couldn’t score any more points. As the final whistle blew, the pouring rain that fell on the Scotland players seemed to sum up both their mood and their performance. It truly was quite bewildering how poor Scotland had been.
Townsend’s team travel down from Tokyo to Kobe today to prepare for their next pool match against Samoa.
The South Sea Islanders ran Scotland close at the 2015 World Cup before losing by just three points. The Samoan coaches must be rubbing their hands with glee at facing this Scotland side.
Certainly the expected easy passage through to the quarterfinals with wins over Samoa, Russia and Japan in the other group games is now no longer a foregone conclusion. If Scotland play as badly as this again, they’ll be home before the postcards.