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February 07, 2015

Scots fall short in Paris

Posted by Editor on February 7, 2015 07:42 PM | No comments | Print | E-mail author

Stuart Hogg impressed in a dangerous looking Scottish backline
France battled to a hard earned 15-8 win over Scotland in their Six Nations clash at the Stade de France.

Scotland scored the only try of the game – through Dougie Fife while France relied on the boot of Camille Lopez for all their points.

Despite only one try being scored, this was a highly entertaining game as Scotland frustrated France in both attack and defence with Finn Russell putting in a superb performance for the visitors.

France showed the best of their game at times – massive power and some beautiful running lines and offloads. However they could not make the pressure tell with Scotland’s defence scrambling well to hold on and France had to rely on three Lopez penalties to give them a 9-8 lead at the break.

Scotland had clawed back three points through a Laidlaw penalty before Dougie Fife scored the only try of the first half.

France ramped up the power game even more in the second half and should have made more of several driving mauls, however Scotland kept them out but did concede a scrum penalty which Lopez duly converted to make it 12-8.

Scotland’s job got even harder when John Beattie was yellow carded for pulling down a driving maul.

France couldn't break down Scotland who stepped up their resistance with 14-men and even got a driving maul of their own going that had France scrambling back in defence.

France were soon back on top though and looked to have scored their first try in the 70th minute after replacement hooker Benjamin Kayser’s long pass out wide – that was almost intercepted by Tim Vissser – found winger Yoann Huget. With Visser out of the picture, Huget raced into space and beat Hogg, and looked certain to score. However Bennett’s last ditch tackle dislodged the ball from the French winger's hands and denied France their first try.

With the clock running down Scotland threw everything into attack but miscommunication between Hogg and Bennett allowed France to hack the ball out of their 22 and put the pressure back on Scotland.

France then won a penalty and Lopez landed his fifth penalty for a hard earned 15-8 win.

Speaks after the game Scotland stand-off Finn Russel told the BBC: "Really disappointing not to get the win. We had a lot of chances but just didn't manage to get the ball to hand.

"They played well. We gave away too many penalties and Lopez kicked well.

"It was a good try to score before half time. If we'd have come back out and backed it up we could have won the game but we made too many mistakes and gave too many penalties away."