Final score in the Junior World Championship. Scotland U20 30-11 Tonga U20. Tries from Duncan Weir, Stuart Hogg & Kerr Gossman


THREE TRY SCOTS POWER PAST TONGA
Wednesday, 22 June 2011

Duncan Weir scores Scotland's first
Scotland Under-20 will face Italy in the ninth-place playoff of the IRB Junior world Championships having beaten Tonga 33-8 at the Stadio Mario Battaglini in Italy tonight.
The Scots confirmed their place in next year’s competition by guaranteeing a place in the top ten as captain Duncan Weir controlled a dominant first-half for the Scots with 13 individual points to Tonga’s three.
Weir continued his clinical form into the second half notching a penalty kick before converting tries from full-back Stuart Hogg and winger Kerr Gossman to a solitary Tongan score to win the match with a comfortable scoreline.
Scotland Under-20 head coach, Peter Wright, said: “The guys stuck at it. It was really hot and that affected them but they stuck to our game plan and we got what we deserved for our performance tonight and earlier in this championship, getting that well earned victory having been close to both England and Ireland earlier in the tournament.
“We got into good situations and executed very well. We had two half decent team tries and Kerr [Gossman] scored a good individual try, which was a fair reward for him as he’d been running well all game.
“The stuff we’ve been consistently trying came together tonight without the errors at crucial times. It’s now up to us to finish strong in our final match against Italy.”
It took just two minutes for the reliable boot of young stand-off Duncan Weir to open the scoring with a penalty kick before almost 20 past before the second score (Tonga’s outside-centre Pita Ahki getting the equaliser).
It was then that, over a period of 10 minutes, the young Glasgow Warriors’ play-maker converted his own try and added a second penalty kick to put Scotland 13-0 up at the interval
HALF TIME: 13-0
Two minutes into the second-half Weir extended the Scots’ lead with his boot however the tough Tongans bit back through lock Loni Toumohuni two minutes later before Ahki, who missed the conversion, stroked over a penalty to just two points short (16-11).
The short shock session by the Tongans It was then that the Scots started to click into gear.
Fresh from a two match suspension, Stuart Hogg (full-back) gassed 40 metres on the diagonal to touchdown and put Scotland out of immediate harm’s reach before winger Kerr Gossman weaved between a host of would-be tacklers to score his second try of the tournament.
Weir converted both efforts to end the scoring and the match with a win for the young Scots.
FULL-TIME: 33-8
Scotland team: Stuart Hogg; Mark Bennett, Sam Atkin, Danny Gilmour, Kerr Gossman; Duncan Weir CAPTAIN, Sean Kennedy, Alex Allan, Richard Ferguson, Colin Phillips, Mitch Todd, Robert McAlpine, Mitch Eadie, Hamish Watson, James Tyas
Substitutes: Michael Liness, George Hunter, Robin Hislop, Jamie Swanson, Jamie Stevenson, Glenn Bryce, Mike Doneghan
 

This article was originally posted on 22-Jun-2011, 18:43 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Hugh Barrow on 22-Jun-2011, 20:23.