At last we can say it. For the first time since 1996, Scotland are two from two in the championship. And for the first time since 1986, we can say that Scotland followed up their win over England with another over someone else.
Maybe that was the most gratifying part of this triumph – the fact that the euphoria of victory over the Auld Enemy was here ridden with maturity to back it up. In so doing, they move neatly on to the shoulder of the mighty Ireland at the top of the table on maximum points, bonus point bagged with a second-half masterclass that yielded four tries.
Wales, so often Scotland’s scourge of late, are not the Wales of recent times. Warren Gatland, whistled up to work his magic once more, dispensed with hundreds of caps for this. Christ Tshiunza was probably the pick of the youngsters here, but he was not the only one to play well. Wales’s deeper problem is that they now find those caps they have borne for so long start to bear down on them. Suddenly, they have a massive rebuild on their hands. They will continue the task bottom of the table, with the weight of everyone else bearing down on them as well.
But the story is Scotland. They started well enough but the game remained alive as the sides turned round at half-time, Scotland just six points ahead with a man in the bin. Duhan van der Merwe, rapidly becoming the terror of the north but quiet in the first 40, burst into life. He did not score for once, but was instrumental in tries for Kyle Steyn, twice, and Blair Kinghorn, who was consummate as an early replacement for Stuart Hogg.
Scotland are far better placed to manage any transition they may find themselves needing to make. Kinghorn is one example, an established presence able to cover for Hogg, who did not return from his Head Injury Assessment in the first half, at full-back and Finn Russell at fly-half. Russell, like Van der Merwe, had not quite lit up the first half but changed all that in the second, winning the man of the match award.
There were a few candidates. Chris Turner was one, scoring Scotland’s only try of the first half, but his yellow card triggered his side’s brief wobble in the last 10 minutes of the first half.
Russell had kicked two penalties in the first quarter to move Scotland into the six-point lead they would retain at half-time. They would extend it to 13 on the half-hour when Turner scored, barrelling over off the back of a driven lineout.
All seemed well with the world but Turner’s day was about to take a turn for the worse, and with it Scotland’s. There was absolutely nothing he could do when George North stepped forcefully off his left foot, low and hard across the covering hooker’s path. Rugby, in its wisdom, chooses to send players off for these events nowadays – at least the card was not red.
A couple of minutes later Wales sent a penalty to the corner, and Ken Owens finished in much the same manner as his opposite number had done five minutes from the break. Wales’s tails were up. They might even have taken the lead on the stroke of half-time but a fumble by Rio Dyer denied the young wing a chance to finish after Alex Cuthbert, on temporarily for North, had broken to a few feet short of the line.
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Scotland welcomed Turner back from his exile early in the second half, and with him returned the swagger. Russell’s sleight of hand out of the tackle set Steyn away in the 51st minute for his first try, after Van der Merwe had wreaked havoc down the left. Then Russell sent over a cross-kick in the 58th for Steyn’s second, finding the wing in acres of space with Williams in the bin for the sort of deliberate tactical offence that does deserve yellow.
That was the game won, but Russell sent over another cross-kick in the last 10 minutes from which Van der Merwe turned the ball inside for Kinghorn’s try, before putting Matt Fagerson over for the coup de grâce in the dying minutes.
It is to Paris next for New Consistent Scotland. Three from three? Let’s not get too carried away just yet. Scotland will not be. Hopefully …
