Duhan van der Merwe inflicted yet more pain on England on Saturday with a superb hat-trick of tries as Scotland came from behind to win 30-21 in the Six Nations at Murrayfield.
Scotland were 10-0 down early on but, inspired by their dashing wing, they bounced back with a third-round win that ended England’s bid for a Grand Slam.
Victory meant Scotland have won four Six Nations games in a row over England for the first time since the late 19th century, and not since 1972 had Scotland reeled off four straight wins over their oldest rivals.
Photo: Reuters
Scotland, in retaining the Calcutta Cup, rebounded from an agonizing loss to France and put themselves back in title contention with two wins from three games after they started with a 27-26 defeat of Wales in Cardiff. The 28-year-old Van der Merwe has now scored 26 tries in 37 Tests, leaving him one try short of Stuart Hogg’s all-time Scotland record.
Saturday’s treble also meant Van der Merwe has scored six tries in his past four games against England alone.
“I can’t believe it to be honest,” Van der Merwe told the BBC. “I have never scored a hat-trick against England, but I have to thank the boys for giving me the opportunity... I guess I am just the lucky one to finish them off.”
England coach Steve Borthwick praised a “very strong” Scotland performance, but also rued his new-look side’s mistakes.
“You saw some aspects of our game step forward today, but there were too many handling errors, and if you turn over that much ball it is very difficult to win a Test match against a quality Scotland team,” he said.
In Saturday’s other game, Ireland beat Wales 31-7 in a sometimes sloppy performance at Lansdowne Road. They now need two wins to secure unprecedented back-to-back Six Nations Grand Slams.
A late Tadhg Beirne try secured a bonus-point win for the hosts, whose 11th successive Six Nations victory equaled the record set by England between 2015-2017.
“Getting a bonus point at the end is always good. We were pretty ill-disciplined, we weren’t happy with how we performed today,” Ireland center Bundee Aki told Welsh broadcaster S4C.
“We knew we would be under the pump a number of times, we knew we had to stick to the process to weather the storm,” he added.
Ireland play England in a fortnight, while Wales will be looking for their first win in this year’s tournament at home to France.
Hong Kong-based cricket team Hung See this weekend found success in their matches in Taiwan, even if none of the results went their way. Hung See played the Chairman’s XI on Saturday morning, the Daredevils that afternoon and PCCT yesterday, with all three home teams winning. The team for Chinese players at the Happy Valley-based Craigengower Cricket Club sends teams on tour to “spread the game of cricket.” This weekend was Hung See’s second trip to Taiwan after visiting Tainan in 2016. “The club has been traveling to all parts of the world since 1982 and the annual tradition continues [with the Taiwan
The San Francisco Giants signed 18-year-old Taiwanese pitcher Yang Nien-hsi (陽念希) to a contract worth a total of US$500,000 (NT $16.39 million). At a press event in Taipei on Wednesday, Jan. 22, the Giants’ Pacific Rim Area scout Evan Hsueh (薛奕煌) presented Yang with a Giants jersey to celebrate the signing. The deal consisted of a contract worth US$450,000 plus a US$50,000 scholarship bonus. Yang, who stands at 188 centimeters tall and weighs 85 kilograms, is of Indigenous Amis descent. With his fastest pitch clocking in at 150 kilometers per hour, Yang had been on Hsueh’s radar since playing in the HuaNan Cup
Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei yesterday advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the Australian Open, while Coco Gauff’s dreams of a first women’s singles title in Melbourne were crushed in the quarter-finals by Paula Badosa. World No. 2 Alexander Zverev was ruffled by a stray feather in his men’s singles quarter-final, but he refocused to beat 12th seed Tommy Paul and reach the semi-finals. Third seeds Hsieh and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia defeated Elena-Gabriela Ruse of Romania and Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine 6-2, 5-7, 7-5 in 2 hours, 20 minutes to advance the semi-finals. Hsieh and Ostapenko converted eight of 14 break
Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and partner Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia yesterday advanced to the women’s doubles final at the Australian Open after defeating New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe and Gabriela Dabrowski of Canada 7-6 (7/3), 3-6, 6-3 in their semi-final. Hsieh has won nine Grand Slam doubles titles and has a shot at a 10th tomorrow, when the Latvian-Taiwanese duo are to play Taylor Townsend of the US and Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic in the championship match at the A$96.5 million (US$61 million) outdoor hard court tournament at Melbourne Park. Townsend and Siniakova eliminated Russian pair Diana Shnaider and Mirra Andreeva 6-7
RSS