Ring-rusty Scotland slow in finishing off defiant Japan

Scotland - 32 Japan - 11 Scotland put in a ring-rusty performance as they struggled to subdue the Japanese yesterday, only securing a bonus point when Simon Taylor scored their fourth try in the 77th minute.

Scotland led by only four points with 13 minutes left and, with Japan playing inventive rugby, the first shock of the tournament was on the cards.

The underdogs could even have gone into the lead if their centre Yukio Motoki had made a better job of his pass to Hirotoki Onozawa instead of throwing it out of play when the wing was free on the touchline.

Taylor picked up from the base of the scrum 20 metres out and threw a hopeful inside pass that deflected off Onozawa before being gobbled up by Chris Paterson, who touched down.

That score gave Scotland breathing space that they barely deserved and late tries from Taylor and Simon Danielli put a gloss on the scoreline.

The coach Ian McGeechan admitted his side lost the pace after a long break without a game. "Our execution was not as good as it should have been," he said.

"We were coming back into international rugby after a break. You can train as much as you like but game time is what you need."

Scotland started quite brightly with Paterson going over for a well-worked try. Keiji Hirose cut the deficit to 7-3 with a 15th-minute penalty and from then on the Japanese never let Scotland out of their sights.

Stuart Grimes romped over for the Scots after a superb pass from Bryan Redpath had put him away on the left touchline only for Hirose to land a second penalty.

At 15-6 up at half-time Scotland would have expected to pull away in the second period but they could not shake off their opponents, who scored their try on 55 minutes when Onozawa finished off a well-worked move initiated by Andrew Miller.

SCOTLAND: Hinchelwood; Paterson (Danielli 79), Craig, McLaren, Logan; Ross (Townsend 66), Redpath (capt); Smith, Russell, Douglas (Kerr 73), Murray (Beattie 66), Grimes, White, Petrie (Leslie 57). Tries: Paterson 2, Grimes, Taylor, Danielli. Cons: Paterson, Townsend. Pen: Paterson.

JAPAN: Matsuda (Kurihara 71); Ohata, Parkinson, Motoki, Onozawa; Hirose (Miller 51), Tsuji (Sonoda 51); Hasegawa, Amino (Sakata h-t), Toyoyama, Kiso, Parker, Okubo (Watanabe 67), Miuchi (capt), Ito. Try: Onozawa. Pens: Hirose 2.

Referee: S Dickinson (Australia).

Guardian Service