{"id":280121,"date":"2025-11-24T06:06:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T06:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/280121\/"},"modified":"2025-11-24T06:06:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T06:06:07","slug":"scotland-56-tonga-0-flat-track-bullies-and-nothing-more-alas-thats-all-we-can-really-say-about-gregor-townsends-team-after-this-pointless-exercise-at-murrayfield","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/280121\/","title":{"rendered":"SCOTLAND 56 TONGA 0: Flat-track bullies and nothing more … alas that’s all we can really say about Gregor Townsend’s team after this pointless exercise at Murrayfield"},"content":{"rendered":"

A pointless\u00a0exercise to round-off what has been a dismal autumn campaign for Scotland. This eight-try rout of an utterly hapless Tonga side ultimately proved nothing in the grand scheme of things.<\/p>\n

It certainly did nothing to dispel the belief that has built over these past four weeks that Gregor Townsend<\/a> has run his race as head coach.<\/p>\n

The capitulation against Argentina last weekend, when Townsend\u2019s team blew a 21-point lead, only underlined the growing feeling that the time for change has come.<\/p>\n

Will that change actually be delivered? No. Not yet, at least. The expectation is that chief executive Alex Williamson will reaffirm his backing for Townsend at Scottish\u2019s Rugby annual general meeting on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Having jumped the gun to hand him a shiny new contract only a couple of months ago, Williamson will cling on for as long as possible to the notion that Townsend is still the right man to move Scotland forward.<\/p>\n

Despite all evidence to the contrary, Townsend is still the SRU\u2019s blue-eyed boy. They will allow him to solider on into the Six Nations<\/a> early next year.<\/p>\n

\"Magnus <\/p>\n

Magnus Bradbury shrugs off the attentions of William Havili during the 56-0 victory<\/p>\n

\"George <\/p>\n

George Horne celebrates with Duhan van der Merwe after scoring Scotland’s seventh try<\/p>\n

But you do wonder how the plates might shift over the course of a championship which begins with a difficult trip to face Italy at the Olimpico in Rome, a venue where Scotland lost on their last visit in 2024.<\/p>\n

They also face trips to Cardiff and Dublin, with their home games against France and a revitalised England. Even at the best of times for the national team, it would be a tough schedule.<\/p>\n

As a spectacle, yesterday\u2019s game was more likely to induce a bout of narcolepsy than move the dial in terms of Townsend\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

True, he didn\u2019t sign his own death warrant against Tonga the same way Andy Robinson did in 2012. In truth, nobody expected that kind of outcome.<\/p>\n

He won the match and reaffirmed his belief that this team are continuing to make progress, despite mounting evidence to the contrary – that this is a side who have regressed.<\/p>\n

The sum of Scotland\u2019s efforts in the autumn campaign has been to blow two huge chances to claim victories, over New Zealand and Argentina, while running up a couple of cricket scores against USA and Tonga.<\/p>\n

Flat-track bullies, nothing more.<\/p>\n

Townsend was defiant when asked about his future last Friday and he doubled down yesterday in his pre-match comments.<\/p>\n

\"Jamie <\/p>\n

Jamie Ritchie and George Turner celebrate what proved a walkover against the hapless Tongans<\/p>\n

\"Sione <\/p>\n

Sione Tuipulotu tries to burst his way past the Tongans at Murrayfield on Sunday<\/p>\n

\u2018The door gets opened when we lose for people who want to criticise,\u2019 he told BBC Scotland.<\/p>\n

As opposed to what? People who *don\u2019t* want to criticise? The happy-clappy brigade who wouldn\u2019t dare say a bad word no matter how bad things get?<\/p>\n

This is where Townsend creates a problem for himself. he refuses to accept or acknowledge valid criticism and instead chooses to paint it as some sort of agenda against him. In other words, he\u2019s right, everyone else is wrong.<\/p>\n

The fact that Scotland supporters could potentially be subjected to another two years of this stuff until the next World Cup is an extremely sobering thought.<\/p>\n

Against such second-rate opposition, Scotland were on the front foot right from the off. A yellow card for Tonga back-rower Semisi Paea was later upgraded to a 20-minute red.<\/p>\n

It was during that period when Scotland did most of the damage, Jamie Ritchie crashing over for the opening try on 11 minutes.<\/p>\n

On his 50th cap, hooker George Turner then scored Scotland\u2019s second, before lock Max Williamson powered over for a third.<\/p>\n

Fly-half Fergus Burke converted all three tries to put Scotland 21-0 ahead against a visiting side who already looked like a rabble.<\/p>\n

\"Duhan <\/p>\n

Duhan van der Merwe offloads during the final match of the autumn series in Edinburgh<\/p>\n

\"Under-pressure <\/p>\n

Under-pressure Gregor Townsend pictured before Sunday’s game kicked off at Murrayfield<\/p>\n

Even after barely 20 minutes, Tonga\u2019s fitness levels were atrocious. They were also guilty of some ridiculously late hits, most of which went unpunished by French referee Luc Ramos.<\/p>\n

Bearing in mind this was a Test match and not some kind of exhibition, Ramos was extremely lenient, not only with how he called the contact area, but the set-piece as well.<\/p>\n

Tom Jordan was having a decent game for Scotland at full-back and so, too, was Burke on what was his first start at Murrayfield.<\/p>\n

Racing into a 21-0 lead after the first quarter, Scotland were going at pretty much a point a minute without actually doing much in attack other than being functional.<\/p>\n

You had to question what the value of all this was. With due respect to Tonga, other than boosting win-rates and other statistics what was really to be gained from playing against such poor opposition?<\/p>\n

Likewise in last year\u2019s autumn campaign, when Scotland were running riot against the bright lights of Portugal. Running up a cricket score against such feeble opposition will do nothing to advance Townsend\u2019s team\u2019s credentials.<\/p>\n

Tonga\u2019s discipline was awful. They had another two players sent to the sin bin either side of half-time. Given how late they were in some tackles, they were lucky not to lose even more players.<\/p>\n

And yet criminally from Scotland\u2019s point of view, in the period when both teams had a full quota of 15 players, the scoreline was actually 0-0. That\u2019s how laboured this was.<\/p>\n

Another Tonga yellow was to follow, centre Fine Inisi punished for a deliberate knock-on. The red jerseys were piling into the sin bin at an astonishing rate.<\/p>\n

\"George <\/p>\n

George Turner dives over the line to score Scotland’s second try in the 56-0 rout<\/p>\n

At one stage, it looked like the Murrayfield bosses would need to build an extension to accommodate them all.<\/p>\n

A burst from Duhan van der Merwe then eased Scotland further ahead as he touched down for the fourth try, with Burke once again converting.<\/p>\n

Ewan Ashman rumbled over to score another try, adding to the two he got against Argentina last week. Now 35-0 ahead, the game was over. It was merely a question of how many Scotland would score.<\/p>\n

The floodgates opened and George Horne raced over to add two more tries, with Ashman also powering over to make it a second brace in as many weeks.<\/p>\n

At the end, as the crowds poured out of Murrayfield and filtered back towards the city centre to find other means of entertainment, the chill in the air was beginning to bite.<\/p>\n

It was time for something to warm the cockles. As the pubs dotted around Haymarket and beyond began to fill up, Townsend will carry on as head coach despite a growing number of fans having already called last orders on his tenure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A pointless\u00a0exercise to round-off what has been a dismal autumn campaign for Scotland. This eight-try rout of an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":280122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[14632,97,5903,23783,217,101,10362,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-280121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-argentina","tag-dailymail","tag-rugby","tag-rugbyunion","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-tonga","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}