Ruthless Scots on the rampage against Romania
MATCH REPORT: Scotland registered twelve tries in their 84-0 victory over Romania at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy in Lille on Saturday evening.
Darcy Graham scored four tries, the first three in the first half while young flyhalf Ben Healy did not miss one conversion.
Scotland was on the scoreboard after nine minutes of play which saw Hamish Watson dive over in the corner. Healy converted and they were leading 7-0 early on.
Then it was the turn of Ali Price to add his name to the scorers after Graham sniped through the middle before off-loading to the scrumhalf.
Scotland 14 Romania 0 after 17 minutes of play. And Romania had already missed 22 tackles.
Three minutes later the crowd was yet again entertained by the fleet footed Graham as he accelerated and cut through the yellow jerseys of Romania with ease to score his first try.
After half an hour Robert Irimescu was sent to the sin-bin for a high tackle on Healy and this gave the Scots more ascendancy.
Another yellow card followed which honestly did not do Romania any good. By the stroke of 36 minutes, the Romanians were down to 12 players.
Scotland bungled two tries in this time, one short and the other knocked on.
The bonus point try for Scotland, thanks to Graham, came just after half an hour of rugby to stretch their lead to 28-0 and clearly Scotland was focused on piling up as many points as possible.
Graham got his hat-trick just before half-time, loving the space created by two less Romanians on the field.
Scotland went on to score 12 tries in this one-sided affair and one of the good news stories out of this game is while Finn Russell's boots are big ones to fill, Healy pulled the strings beautifully for Scotland and also got a try of his own.
Every Scotland player took their opportunity while being patient in their build-up play.
This game was all about setting down a statement and they did it in style.
There must be sympathy for Romania - they lost to South Africa and Ireland heavily and were staring down the barrel of a heavy one against Scotland. There is pride and spirit in this Romania team. They have Tonga to play and they will be targeting that game.
Scotland did what they needed to do and dispatched Romania in clinical style.
Now Ireland lie in wait next weekend to decide who will progress to the quarterfinals.
Man of the Match: Darcy Graham - his four tries set up the sterling win for Scotland - his hat-trick in the bag in the first half.
Scorers:
For Scotland:
Tries: Watson, Price, Graham 4, Fagerson, Harris, Smith, Healy, Matthews, Darge
Cons: Healy 11, Horne
Yellow cards: Robert Irimescu (Romania - 29’ high tackle), Florian Rosu, (Romania - 31’ high tackle), Marius Simionescu (Romania - 38’ high tackle)
Teams:
Scotland: 15 Ollie Smith, 14 Darcy Graham, 13 Chris Harris, 12 Cameron Redpath, 11 Kyle Steyn, 10 Ben Healy, 9 Ali Price, 8 Matt Fagerson, 7 Hamish Watson, 6 Luke Crosbie, 5 Grant Gilchrist (captain), 4 Sam Skinner, 3 Javan Sebastian, 2 Ewan Ashman, 1 Jamie Bhatti.
Replacements: 16 Johnny Matthews, 17 Rory Sutherland, 18 WP Nel, 19 Scott Cummings, 20 Rory Darge, 21 George Horne, 22 Blair Kinghorn, 23 Huw Jones.
Romania: 15 Marius Simionescu, 14 Sioeli Lama, 13 Jason Tomane, 12 Fonovai Tangimana, 11 Taliauli Sikuea, 10 Alin Conache, 9 Gabriel Rupanu, 8 Cristi Chirica (captain), 7 Dragos Ser, 6 Florian Rosu, 5 Stefan Iancu, 4 Adrian Motoc, 3 Gheorghe Gajion, 2 Robert Irimescu, 1 Alexandru Savin.
Replacements: 16 Florin Bardasu, 17 Iulian Hartig, 18 Costel Burtila, 19 Marius Iftimiciuic, 21 Damian Stratila, 21 Florin Surugiu, 22 Todor Boldor, 23 Nicolas Onitu.
Referee: Wayne Barnes (England)
Assistant Referees: Angus Gardner (Australia), James Doleman (New Zealand)
TMO: Brendon Pickerill (New Zealand)