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By Tom English
BBC Scotland
After Scotland completed their media conference on Saturday at Takanawa at Tokyo, it appeared that 100 days had passed since they first met up to get ready for the World Cup.
One hundred times of coaching meetings and sessions, of previews and testimonials, of matches and traveling and preparation for the opener from Ireland.
Sunday was 101, that was sort of suitable given its connotations because George Orwell (an anagram of his name being Ell Gregor Woe) composed about people being tormented in his book Nineteen Eighty-Four. You and you have Space 101 and Rugby 101; Townsend’s disturbing present and Orwell’s dystopian near future, respectively.
It’s difficult to know how many times management and Scotland’s players talked during these first 100 days, but it was in the dozens. Fighting talk. They threw their shoulders back and gave about how great they can be it large.
Before the Ireland game, they talked about how hard they’d been operating on defence, just how far they were going to goal Johnny Sexton, the way the herd of rampaging wildebeest would not create them take a step against the Irish, the way they were saving their very best things for your World Cup.
Of course the Scots must back themselves in public. They pass a World Cup death sentence independently and could barely don the black cap, but they needed to provide a performance and they never came close. If they came on in the first location their lights went out early.
Scotland are sold. They win a couple games and everyone gets giddy, such as us in the media, when reporting on this group who are starved of joy which every big victory at Murrayfield is thought of as a turning point.
It becomes a turning point when they actually flip, not by delivering just only win in five matches in the most recent Six Nations before going into reverse if they approach the turn. In their past six championship games, they have a single victory.
Following six minutes in Yokohama, they surrendered the very first attempt. By the moment the barnstorming Iain Henderson ran free of Grant Gilchrist along with Stuart McInally, you knew that the dent came.
Because those moments are almost come in by the dent you would have bet the house on it. Scotland’s defence was dumb to catch across the corner at James Ryan and the ruck moved over. Easy.
After 14 minutes, they conceded a second try a pushed line-out off. Anyone who watches that Scotland team could have gone once again began to move forward. Some groups hold the business and belligerence to maintain teams out in those times. If their defence is worried, frequently, Scotland fold. Ireland head coach Joe Schmidt knows better than anybody. He performed it.
A person arrived off a Scotland mistake after 26 minutes down the other end of the area. A scrum, some hard-running from CJ Stander, more slackness out of another touch try and Scotland, this one by Tadhg Furlong. Not half an hour played and the game has been done. One hundred days of prep – because of this?
A view is out there – shared that Scotland have confronted in times – that when it comes to the collective talents of the team some of them have to say for themselves. Individuals who have actually won items in this sport listen to the conversation from several Scotland players and trainers about wanting to play with rugby in the world’s quickest brand – a mantra repeated again after the beating of Sunday.
Scotland and Ireland are Celtic cousins however in rugby terms there’s no relation. This year has been hard their form diminished, for these players, their confidence severely damaged, louder and their critics . No amount of silverware from their all-conquering 2018 gets protected them .
They guys, though. Relentless. Tough mentally and physically. Strength of character – and high quality of coach and participant – looks to be receiving them during their slump. They are a force which will have drunk in the conversation of Scotland and quietly fed off it.
Just the hopelessly optimistic (or delusional) Scotland fan would have predicted a victory on Sunday. There was little evidence to suggest it was probable. Since Schmidt entered the spectacle as 15, ireland had won five of their six meetings. They scored 21 tries in these games and won by an average of 14 points.
Yes, his 2019 form was bad up until their recent win over Wales in Dublin, but win suggested they got back to the things they were. It was a portent of doom for the Scots.
Ireland were hot favourites and also there would have been shame in Scotland dropping to them provided that they made their enemies struggle for this, which they didn’t. They dropped into a heap and talked the talk. The galling thing is not that Scotland lost, it is that Scotland never turned .
Townsend’s entry in the aftermath that they lacked electricity and aggression at the beginning of the game was a shocker the same thing before, and seen even though we had heard. And lately. And over once.
Last month, when passive at a 32-3 defeat against France at Nice, Matt Taylor, the Scotland defence coach, talked about the lack of urgency of the team.
“On reflection, maybe we should have poked and prodded and fired up the boys over we did,” he said.
They want poking and prodding to get up themselves for a Test match?
“We just left it to the players to get themselves in the ideal frame of mind,” he added. “With it being a warm-up game in a great area like Nice, we only assumed that amount of intensity was definitely going to be there and it wasn’t.”
It was not there in Yokohama to get a World Cup match, it wasn’t there in Nice, it wasn’t there at the opening 30 minutes in Twickenham when England scored four attempts, it was not there against Wales and Ireland at Edinburgh or from France in Paris.
In their 11 matches, Scotland have conceded 12 attempts in the opening 14 minutes. At the identical period, Ireland have surrendered two. The lack of aggression and power is a weakness that Townsend has not fixed.
On Monday they go for Kobe, where they and Samoa play per week after. Shorn their players poached by other countries and of fund, the Pacific Islanders continue to be subjected to the most shameful treatment by the world game. They have dropped to the USA, Fiji and Australia in their previous few matches, however there were signs against the Wallabies that they’re starting to put something together again. Four decades back, they frightened the wits .
Nothing which Samoa, or Japan, will probably have observed on Sunday will give any concern to them. The set of them remain underdogs but they will smack on a giant target on the backs of all these players that are Scotland and go afterwards with intent. In the case of the Samoans, a poisonous purpose.
The nations have met on the view of Townsend. It had been in the fall of 2017, a 44-38 win in Murrayfield. Scotland scored six tries that day. Samoa believed five. Scotland should win this next game, but they will be battered in the process. This week will probably be gloomy. They are in a hole. A one.
Read more here: http://www.nemetvolgyiantikvarium.hu/2019/10/15/yoel-romero-vs-ronaldo-jacare-souza-2-headlines-ufc-on-espn-3/
