IT was one of those surreal moments you sometimes get at World Cups. Japan had battled gamely against Scotland in 2003, but lost to a late flurry of scores. Their captain was asked afterwards what he made of the game and responded with an impassioned rant that lasted fully five minutes. “He says he is very proud of the team,” was the terse English version from the their translator.
Later, Japanese journalists gave the game away. He had been furious. The way he saw it, Japan were on the cusp of a magnificent breakthrough win until a few players got over-excited, abandoned the game plan and allowed the Scots to break clear. He had a point. For 65 minutes there was not much in it, only an interception try from Simon Danielli giving the Scots the advantage.
Nor were Scotland much better the following game, against the USA. It had been a slow start to a World Cup campaign and it not only put the side on the back foot before the bigger threats arrived, but also became the pattern for World Cups to come. At least in that tournament and the following one in 2007 they did recover to reach the quarter- finals but in 2011, there was no such progress.
In 2003, among the interested spectators back in Scotland was Matt Taylor, an Australian-born flanker who had been capped for the Dark Blues’ A team while playing for the Borders. Those early stumbles are something he has never forgotten and now he is back as Scotland’s defence coach Taylor is determined they will not be a feature of the World Cup campaign this year, when, co- incidentally, Japan and the USA are again the opening opponents.
“It’s been a bit of a theme running through Scotland in the past,” he said. “We know that come World Cup time there are no easy games so we’re really focused first of all on those first two games, doing well and winning. Then we look at what else is happening and focus on the second block in the pool.
“We have four warm-up games that will give us more continuity and can alleviate some of that [slow start] but Japan and the USA are going to be very hard. Obviously Samoa and South Africa are extremely hard too.”
The idea is that four warm-up games, the last likely to involve most of the players who will feature in the World Cup opener, will get the Scots up to match speed before the tournament, and the involvement of so many players from Glasgow, where Taylor also coaches, will also give them the cohesion that matters so much.
After all, confidence there should be at an all-time high after their Guinness PRO12 triumph, the sort of feeling Taylor has now exper- ienced twice after helping steer the Queensland Reds to the Super 15 title before returning to Scotland.
“Glasgow was such an unbelievable feeling, similar to the Reds in that it was the first time that we’d achieved it after working hard for a number of years to get there,” he said. We had this picture up of being the first Scottish side to win the PRO12. They’d been close or the three years that Gregor [Townsend] has been there so it’s great to finally achieve it. I’ve been so lucky as a coach and privileged to win those sorts of things.”
Taylor added: “My driving goal as a coach is to do something special with Scotland. I’d love to be here when Scotland win a Six Nations. And I’d love to do really well in this World Cup too.”
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