‘We played with speed, the chaotic way’

inches away from another two as he won the Man of the Match award.

He was followed on to the scoresheet by Sean Maitland, Huw Jones, Ali Price, Jonny Gray, Stuart McInally and John Barclay, with Australia — who lost Sekope Kepu to a red card just before half-time — responding with a double from Tevita Kuridrani, and tries by Kurtley Beale and Lopeti Timani.

Scotland skipper Barclay insisted that McGuigan’s performance was symptomatic of the new levels of confidence in the players.

‘The manner of how we performed is the most encouraging thing for me,’ he said. ‘The scoreline will be focused on outside the group, but we spoke a lot about backing up the way we tried to play last week, the template of playing with speed, the chaotic way.

‘Australia are a very good team. They lost a player but sometimes that galvanises a team, so it was absolutely fantastic. It meant a lot to the guys after the disappointment of last week.

‘But you can see the confidence in the team. It’s hard to explain but you see guys like Jamie Bhatti and Darryl Marfo coming in and they are playing with confidence, and Byron came on today from the bench and that’s quite intimidating — suddenly starting against the third best team in the world — and he’s man of the match!

‘But every player who has come in the last few weeks has stepped up and looked very comfortable in the group, and that says a lot about the mindset.’

Scotland have scored 16 tries in their three autumn Tests and while the coaches are eager to reduce those scored against, they conceded 12, fans are not concerned when their team finishes on the winning side.

Australia have lost to Scotland home and away this year, and skipper Michael Hooper admitted: ‘It is very frustrating, but Scotland are always a very difficult challenge. I’ve never has an easy game against Scotland which will be reflected in the results.

‘It’s a grind of a game, it’s physical and I thought they were class tonight.’

For Barclay, not selected by Scotland for three years prior to Vern Cotter bringing him back, it is a good time to be playing for Scotland.

‘It’s great to be back,’ he added. ‘The way we are trying to play is really exciting. It’s a honour to be captain.’