SCOTLAND’S last two games were decided in the closing minutes, and we can expect something similar this afternoon against Wales, according to assistant coach Jonathan Humphreys.

Two late Greig Laidlaw penalties gave the Scots a 27-22 win over Ireland in the first match of this year’s Six Nations Championship, but then they went down 22-16 to France after being level with 10 minutes to go. Statistics show that the Welsh improve as the match goes on, Humphreys explained, so Scotland will look to their substitutes to take the game to the visitors.

“The stats say that Wales are a better team in the second half,” he said yesterday. “We feel that we have a bench that can make a difference - we feel that we have more power than we have had for a long, long time on our bench. So hopefully we’re ahead and trying to really push on.

“But Wales could start at 100 miles an hour, so all those best-laid plans go out the window. We understand the threat of Wales, but we’re concentrating on ourselves in terms of how we start this game correctly, how we keep the pressure on, and how we don’t relent like we did for periods of the game against Ireland. So when those games are tight at 60/65 minutes we have the right call process to close those games out.”

One obvious difference between the first two games was that Laidlaw, the captain, led the fightback against the Irish but went off injured in the first half in Paris. Back-row forward John Barclay has taken over as skipper from the scrum-half, who has been ruled out for the rest of the competition, but Humphreys insisted that Laidlaw would still have an influence.

“Just because he’s not here doesn’t mean that everything we’ve put in place has gone - it’s not. It’s up to other people to step up. It’s up to other people to take a more hands-on leadership role.”