Scotland win Calcutta Cup at Twickenham

A generation of Scots finally got to feel it – a sensation from 38 calendars ago. Scotland beat their great rivals England at Twickenham for the first time since 1983.

On the 150th anniversary of these two first doing battle, Scotland came to town and claimed an 11-6 victory.

It was a triumph founded as much on savviness as it was ferocity. England struggled with their discipline all match long and let in a Duhan van der Merwe try when they were down to 14 men after a Billy Vunipola yellow card, and England did get half their points while Finn Russell was in the sin-bin for an attempted trip.

But when it was a full compliment of players on the field, it looked like Scotland had the much better gameplan – and delivered it better.

Indeed, when Russell came back onto the field eight minutes into the second half and kicked a penalty to make it 11-6, that was it for point-scoring, and the visitors knucled down to see out the result.

Immediately after the match Eddie Jones made it clear that he took responsibility for not preparing his charges well enough. He also saw his team as second best in a number of departments and he reiterated several times that in the first half alone, England enjoyed just 25% possession.

This was only Scotland’s fourth win in an opening match in the Six Nations era. And it was their first of those opening wins away from Murrayfield.

The great shame of it all is that no Scotland fans can say “I was there”… But that will not dampen the sense of jubilation one bit.

While none of these Scotland players had won at Twickenham before, it was debutants Cameron Redpath and David Cherry who had the honour of lifting the Calcutta Cup.

In the coming days we will see hefty criticism levelled at England’s attack (or lack thereof). Centre Ollie Lawrence made his first carry of the game on 62 minutes while wideout Anthony Watson made his first on 58 minutes. Does that speak of the attacking endeavour we all hoped for from the reigning Six Nations champions?

Scotland played at a pace from the get-go, with debutant centre Redpath undaunted and even coming away with a crucial turnover in the second half. Skipper Stuart Hogg kicked with precision and distance while the team’s defence was brutal all match.

Hogg told ITV Sport: “It’s amazing for us, we believed in each other and to a man deserved it. We got excited during the week, we knew we could put in a performance. If we got everything right, we stood a chance of winning.

“We stood firm defensively, and that was the winning of the game. We went for multi-phase and caused England problems. We are not going to get too far ahead, enjoy this and then onto Wales next week.”