Six Nations: Scotland 50 France 40
Wings Darcy Graham and Kyle Steyn scored two tries each as Scotland beat France 50-40 in Edinburgh on Saturday to secure a pulsating bonus-point win that ensures the Six Nations will be decided in the final round next weekend.
Despite the defeat, a try-scoring bonus-point means France head the table on points-difference from Scotland with both teams on 16 points from their five games. Ireland are still in the mix with 14 points but will face a revitalised Scotland side who ran in seven tries at Murrayfield.
This was a rout of the Six Nations favourites, an absolute rout. The scoreline, outlandish though it may seem from the championship’s serial underachievers, in no way flatters Scotland.
Indeed, it might be said to underestimate how comprehensive this win was. Scotland’s regret will be to have conceded four tries in the last 15 minutes. That denies Scotland top-of-the-table status going into the final round. France remain on course, just about. Their bonus point, ending up with six tries out of the game’s 13, keeps them ahead of Scotland on points difference. Such is that margin, the title remains France’s to lose.
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But let’s focus on the seven tries Scotland scored. The seventh, scored by Tom Jordan in the 63rd minute, put the hosts 47-14 up. Not even Scotland, their recent history replete with tales of agony, could lose from there. A Finn Russell penalty with a couple of minutes to go brought up the 50, but Tomas Ramos’s second try of the day in the last play of the game gave France the final word.
It was clear more or less from the off that this, the most anticipated match yet of the championship, was not going to disappoint. The sun was out on a crisp spring afternoon, the French too in fine voice. And the wingers were quick to make their impression, always a good sign, the two pairs sharing the game’s first four tries between themselves, each one a gem. Even when Pierre Schoeman, a prop would you believe, muscled his way on to the scoresheet, eight minutes from the break to earn Scotland a 19-14 lead at the interval, he did it with a certain panache, reward for some sterling work with ball in hand.
French flanker Oscar Jegou scores in the corner during the Six Nations match against Scotland at Murrayfield. Photograph: Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images
Graham finally pulled ahead of Duhan van der Merwe at the top of Scotland’s try-scoring chart when he went over for his 36th Test try after only four minutes. Scotland’s midfield was in imperious form, Huw Jones’s half-break paving the way, and Russell looping round Sione Tuipulotu to put Graham away. But it was soon over to France’s marquee players to turn the game either side of the 20-minute mark.
Antoine Dupont ripped the ball off Tuipulotu like the backrow forward he could probably be if he wanted, and the ball was whipped wide to that man again, Louis Bielle-Biarrey, to score. A few minutes later, he turned provider, his chip setting up Theo Attissogbe for France’s second.
But Scotland utterly dominated the second quarter from there. Steyn was worked over from a sweet lineout move, before Schoeman had his moment in the sun, picking from the base of a ruck and dummying his way over from close range. Mathieu Jalibert was shown yellow, to boot.
Scotland couldn’t score while he was away, but, boy, they did when he came back. Four tries in the next 20 minutes blew France away.
First the bonus-point try. Another attacking lineout, another series of charges, and Ben White sniped over by the posts, following a muscular carry by Zander Fagerson, brought off the bench at the end of the first half.
The scoreboard displays the final 50-40 scoreline at Murrayfield. Photograph: Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images
Even Dupont, it seems, might be human. His pass was picked off by Steyn a few minutes later, who ran home for his second. Graham answered back with his second four minutes later again, before Dupont’s wild forward pass behind his own line offered up the attacking scrum from which Jordan completed the rout. We still had quarter of an hour to play.
Credit to France. They kept coming. Dupont reimposed some measure of his class with a try in the 66th minute, and three more followed in the last 10, now with his deputy Baptiste Serin pulling the strings with aplomb. Ramos clinched the bonus point with five to go, and a sweetly worked try by Oscar Jegou paved the way for Ramos’s second, another beauty.
But it does not change the fact Scotland have won three in a row now. They have produced two championship-defining performances here at Murrayfield. After years of exhilarating rugby spoiled time and again by mental weakness, they have already backed up the promise with a level of achievement that Gregor Townsend richly deserves so deep into his rein. This was a joy to behold. Rugby. Bloody hell. – Guardian
SCORING SEQUENCE – 4 mins: Graham try, Russell con, 7-0; 17: Bielle-Biarrey try, Ramon con, 7-7; 21: Attissogbe try, Ramos con, 7-14; 26: Steyn try, 12-14; 31: Schoeman try, Russell con, 19-14; Half-time: 19-14; 43: White try, Russell con, 26-14; 50: Steyn try, Russell con, 33-14; 58: Graham try, Russell con, 40-14; 62: Jordan try, Russell con, 47-14; 65: Dupont try, Ramos con, 47-21; 73: Ramos try, 47-26; 77: Russell pen, 50-26; 78: Barassi try, Ramos con, 50-33; 80: Ramos try, con, 50-40.
SCOTLAND: Blair Kinghorn; Darcy Graham, Huw Jones, Sione Tuipulotu, Kyle Steyn; Finn Russell, Ben White; Pierre Schoeman, George Turner, D’Arcy Rae; Gregor Brown, Scott Cummings; Matt Fagerson, Rory Darge, Jack Dempsey.
Replacements: Grant Gilchrist for Brown (33 mins); Zander Fagerson for Rae (39); Josh Bayliss for Cummings, Ewan Ashman for Turner (both 51); Tom Jordan for Jones (55); George Horne for White, Rory Sutherland for Schoeman (both 63); Freddy Douglas for Steyn (66).
FRANCE: Thomas Ramos; Theo Attissogbe, Nicolas Depoortere, Yoram Moefana, Louis Bielle-Biarrey; Matthieu Jalibert, Antoine Dupont (capt); Jean-Baptiste Gros, Julien Marchand, Dorian Aldegheri; Charles Ollivon, Mickael Guillard; Francois Cros, Oscar Jegou, Anthony Jelonch.
Replacements: Lenni Nouchi for Jelonch (42 mins); Pierre-Louis Barassi for Depoortere, Emmanuel Meafou for Guillard, Thibaud Flament for Ollivon, Peato Mauvaka for Marchand (all 44); Demba Bamba for Aldegheri, Rodrigue Neti for Gros (both 51); Baptiste Serin for Dupont (68).
Yellow card: Jalibert (32 mins); Nouchi (58).
Referee: A Gardner (Aus).
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