SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY REPORTS


Under-20 World Championship: Scotland have second chance to reverse Six Nations defeat

By Alan Lorimer
SCOTLAND have a chance to reverse their Six Nations result when they face Ireland today in the final round of the IRB Under-20 World Championship at Rodney Parade in Newport to determine the 9th/10th places in the tournament.
The Scots lost to Ireland in Athlone earlier this year in a closely contested match.

"We had a chance to win in the Six Nations but we didn't squeeze them out" said Scotland U20 manager John Jeffrey, adding: "If we can secure a win today then weADVERTISEMENT'll improve on our 10th seeding in the championship".

Ninth or 10th is just about where Scotland stand in age grade rugby on the global stage. The higher echelons, as Scotland found out in their 72-3 defeat by South Africa, are out of reach.

Yet Scotland came very close to defeating Samoa in the first of their pool matches which would have propelled them into the 5-8 group of countries alongside France, Australia and Argentina, all of the above mentioned with the resources to be able to compete in age grade rugby.

Having suffered a whitewash in the Six Nations and defeats in their opening two World Championship matches, Scotland would dearly like to finish their campaign with a win, to add to their earlier tournament victories over USA and Canada.

But Ireland, who reached this play-off round with an extra-time 9-6 win over Italy, will present a difficult challenge entirely, particularly in the backs, where their strength at half back, at outside centre and full back will pose problems.

The key to winning the match will be ball-winning in contact and in this context the selection of Lewis Calder will help.

And if the Scots can produce the kind of attacking game that amassed six tries against USA then they have a chance of making a positive statement in what is their final performance on the world stage.

There was a last-minute change in line-up for Scotland, with Bristol's Josh Brown being withdrawn from the squad after suffering concussion in training. That has seen Niall Shannon promoted to the starting line-up, with Alexander Wukovits called into the squad.

Scotland Under-20: Murray Allan (Loughborough University); Tom Bury (Boroughmuir), Paul Loudon (Durham University), Steve McColl (Dunfermline), Lee Jones (Selkirk); James Murray (Leeds Carnegie and Edinburgh Academicals), Ross Samson (Newcastle Falcons); Gary Strain (Glasgow Hawks), Adrian Duncan (Stewart's-Melville FP), Lewis Niven (Edinburgh Academicals), Fraser McKenzie (Heriot's), Niall Shannon (Aberdeen GSFP), Lewis Calder (Newcastle Falcons) (captain), Andrew Rose (Hartpury College), Craig Simmonds (Heriot's) Substitutes: Alexander Wukovits (Begles-Bordeaux), Gavin Cameron (Ellon), Neale Patrick (Dunfermline), Jonny Baird (Watsonians) Peter Jericevich (GHA), Ruaridh Jackson (Glasgow Hawks), Peter Horne (Howe of Fife)

This article was posted on 22-Jun-2008, 07:35 by Hugh Barrow.