SCOTLAND will qualify for the quarter-finals of the Rugby World Cup with any kind of win against Samoa next Saturday, despite losing 34-16 to South Africa in Newcastle yesterday. The Springboks, who won the try count 3-1 and were 20-3 up at the break, are now top of Pool B with 11 points, one ahead of the Scots. They will win the pool provided they beat the United States on Wednesday.

Japan, who beat Samoa 26-5 yesterday to move on to eight points, are the only other team in the running for a top-two place. But they can only qualify if Scotland or South Africa lose their remaining games, and look doomed to be in the rare position of winning three matches - their remaining fixture is against the US next Sunday - yet still being knocked out of the tournament.

For the third match running, Scotland got off to a quiet start against the Springboks, but burst into life in the second half. At one point they were only seven points behind, but the boot of Handre Pollard kept his team in front.

“The score’s a pretty fair reflection of the game,” Scotland coach Vern Cotter said. “They dominated the contact areas. In the second half I thought our players stepped up and starting matching their intensity.

“[The slow first half] will be talked about this week. It was good we got back within seven points, and that’s something we’ll have to develop - a little self-belief. I thought if we stayed close long enough they’d become unsettled.”

Greig Laidlaw, the captain, agreed that Scotland could not afford to begin their next game so slowly if they want to make sure they dominate against Samoa. “We’re playing good teams, so it takes time to break them down,” he said. “We probably are starting slightly slow, and we’ll need to fix that for Samoa, because they’ll come flying out the blocks.

“We were losing the collisions. The breakdown was a mess. Too many errors crept into our game.”

South Africa, having lost to Japan two weeks ago, had to treat this match as if it were a knockout. Their coach, Heyneke Meyer, was delighted by their response - and not too troubled by their failure to claim a bonus point. “It was a clinical performance,” he said. “It wasn’t easy.

“I thought the youngsters did well at the lineout - that was the winning and losing of the game. The defence did well to keep them to one try. We just needed [to win by] one point.”