CONTRARY to the entreaties of the man in the Stadio Olimpico Public Address booth, no respect whatsoever was shown to the kicker as Greig Laidlaw stood over that treacherous but potentially game-winning penalty on Saturday lunchtime.
The Roman public are a demonstrative bunch who were never likely to fall silent as if they were in a library when they felt they could assist their heroes’ brave attempts to land their first Six Nations win in 17 attempts. Jeers and whistles were one thing, but even the timing of the announcement – just as Laidlaw stepped up to make the kick – seemed strategically timed to cause maximum disruption to his routine.
But when all the hubbub had died down, and the ball had bisected the posts, everyone had to grudgingly respect the quality of the Scottish kicker’s execution, not to mention his mental fortitude. While the 32-year-old – who also landed a nerveless late shot at goal in 19-16 win against Argentina at Murrayfield in November 2016 – joked last night that he had asked his team-mates to stop putting him in this position, in truth he is no stranger to having a soundtrack whilst kicking for goal. On club duty with Clermont-Auverne, the custom is to make as much noise as possible rather than as little.
“It’s something you get used to as a kicker,” said Laidlaw, who missed just one of his five attempts on Saturday. “Noise is noise, no matter what kind of noise it is.
“Probably it helps that I play in France where they actually make noise when you kick so it is not something that is new to me,” he added. “Certainly in home matches, Clermont is really loud, I think it can help young kickers coming through to play out in France, because you just learn to block everything out.
“You just concentrate on your technique and thankfully it held up again. Although I have already said to the boys preferably don’t put me in that position too many more times …”
“It went between the posts and over the bar, so I was quite happy with it! I hit the ball fairly nicely all day, apart from the first one.”
The Eternal City of Rome might be associated with beauty and ‘La Dolce Vita’ but for Scotland on Saturday this was a reminder of the merits of winning ugly. If it is the mark of a good team to be able to win matches when not playing well then that old phrase must apply to Gregor Townsend’s side, who could easily have found this game was beyond them after an opening hour in which most of the tempo, intensity and ball belonged to the hosts.
Like tourists fated to return after throwing coins in the Trevi fountain, Scotland were staring headlong at another episode of Italian ignominy here, at a venue where they had lost five times of their previous nine matches.
As much as there was to admire about the hosts’ performance, built on the bravura ball carrying of big men like Sebastian Negri, Jake Polledri and Sergio Parisse, Scotland are still conceding too many tries, particularly on their travels. Having conceded eight tries combined across Cardiff and Dublin, another two were shipped in the opening 20 minutes here through Tommaso Allan, whose father was born in Scotland, and another to the Italians’ livewire full back Matteo Minozzi.
It was an angry Townsend who had met the players at half-time, 17-12 down, making the unusual decision to replace all three members of his front row there and then. And still things were to get worse before they got better - when Allan ran on to a Polledri pass for the Italian’s third try of the day.
But the Scots held their nerve, getting territory and possession for a change, and inexorably making inroads into the Italian defences with a series of lineout drives which demoralised and sapped the energy of their opponents. First half tries from Fraser Brown, and John Barclay following one such maul, were added to by Sean Maitland and Stuart Hogg during that second period.
They even had to come from behind twice, after being pegged back at 27-26 again by a booming Allan kick, but when the dust had settled Scotland had a third Six Nations win for a second successive year, while Italy joined the France team of 1911-1920 as co-owners of the worst-ever run of defeats in this championship with 17.
Laidlaw took huge satisfaction in the manner these players dug themselves out of their collective hole. “This is something we have been working on for a few years now, how to win ugly,” he said.“We have done it a few times at Murrayfield too, I remember the Argentina game a couple of years back. So we can win ugly. We don’t want to, but it was still tremendous to come out on top like that after what was a scrappy game. We might not have come back from that a couple of back, two or three years ago, so to be able to do that is pleasing. We understand now that even if we are behind we still back our skillsets. The leadership in the group was really impressive. Everyone took a deep breath, listened to what the plan was, and we pulled ourselves out of the hole.”
Considering his campaign began with him just back after injury and playing second fiddle to to Ali Price, Laidlaw has made a statement during this Six Nations. Scrum half is a position of strength but right now it is hard to imagine Scotland without him, even if he switched to fly half for a second time this year following the head knock sustained by Finn Russell. “I am pretty competitive and I love playing for my country,” he said. “It is something I don’t take lightly. When I get the opportunity I try to put my best foot forward and help the group in whatever way we can.”
If this was a break-out performance from Conor O’Shea’s Italy, Scotland’s refusal to be derailed suggests we are trucking along nicely some 18 months out from the World Cup.”We are still evolving,” said Laidlaw. “We want to be a bit further down the track - look at the Welsh performance and the Irish result. But we are a lot further down the track than we were after playing some good rugby in some big games.”
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel