FEW Scotland players have known the joy of winning in Paris, but it is an experience that Hamish Watson thought he and his team-mates were very close to tasting yesterday. The Edinburgh flanker, who played every minute of the 22-16 defeat by France, was convinced that his team had passed up a historic opportunity to win in the Stade de France for the first time this century.

The losing bonus point for that narrow loss was little consolation for Watson, who thought that with a little more composure - as they had shown in beating Ireland at Murrayfield eight days earlier - Scotland would have won at the Stade de France for the first time since 1999. “We could definitely have won that game,” Watson said. “It’s not one of those days when you’re thinking: ‘F***. They were a lot better than us.’ We definitely could have won it.

“So that’s more frustrating. But we also know what went wrong. We’ll try to fix that for the Wales game [at Murrayfield a week on Saturday].

“Obviously everyone is pretty gutted because we knew we hadn’t won here since ’99. We were in the lead and definitely in a position to win – so everyone is disappointed because we could have won it.”

Scotland knew that the bigger French forwards were going to try and steamroller them, but the plan was to tire them out. Instead, it was France who finished the stronger, while the visitors lost several key players to injury.

“That was very tough,” Watson continued. “Obviously they’ve got big players, a big pack, so it was pretty bruising.

“I think when we got the ball and held on to it, we all made yards. At times, though, we would just give the ball away a bit stupidly. There were a lot of turnovers in the game. We didn’t look after it as well as we wanted. So when we didn’t stick to our game plan, it didn’t go our way.

“Yes, the game was there to be won. Definitely.

“When Tim [Swinson] scored that try, I think you saw that France were there for the taking. Then, from the kick-off, we gave away the ball straight away – and they scored a penalty two minutes later. They managed to draw it level pretty quickly.

“If we had kept that lead and just exited properly, maybe got another penalty, their tails would have gone down. We could definitely have gone on and won the game.”

Scotland lost Greig Laidlaw to injury in the first half, and, while praising Ali Price for his contribution off the bench, Watson accepted that the captain had been a significant miss. “Obviously Greig is a big talisman for us. He’s our captain, so you are going to miss your captain.

“Ali came on and did a great job, quickened the game up. I thought he was good when he came on. But losing your captain - it takes a bit of time to get over that.

“I think it was down to control. They got six points clear and it was going to be tough from there. We did get a chance: we attacked in that last five minutes of the game. We just messed up, didn’t support our ball carriers enough.

“They looked like they were tiring at times. But when they get the ball, that’s when they’re dangerous – all the big forwards love that sort of stuff.

“If we could have kept the ball longer, they would have tired. But in that second half, we didn’t keep the ball as we would have liked. Another score for us after that try, their heads would have dropped – and that would have made them feel tired.”

While the Swinson try was the result of a sudden break and kick ahead by Tommy Seymour, Scotland’s first try, scored by Stuart Hogg on his 50th appearance for his country, was a more carefully crafted effort. Watson suggested that if Scotland had been able to repeat the patient approach work that bore fruit, it could have paid off again.

“If you look at the first try, we didn’t panic, we went through the phases, didn’t try any stupid off-loads – and then scored in the corner,” he added. “In the second half, I don’t know what the exact figures are, but there were a few stupid off-loads, a few penalties over ball because we didn’t get support over the ball quick enough. We didn’t do enough to tire them out and use our backs wide.

“We needed to realise it was still just a three-point game at that stage. When it got to six points, it was always going to be tough. We weren’t looking after it.

“We’re still in the Championship, definitely. We’ve got Wales at home, which is a huge game for us. We won our first game at home – so there’s no reason why we can’t beat Wales.”