After Scotland’s Grant Gilchrist was sent off after six minutes, the visitors conceded three unanswered tries in the first quarter of the game. The match looked like a foregone conclusion. Romain Ntamack, Ethan Dumortier and Thomas Ramos all crossed over for France, and two conversions built a 19-0 lead.
However, Scotland did not allow themselves to roll over in defeat. They forged a comeback thanks to try tries from Huw Jones, and with Finn Russell also scoring. Jones spoke after the match, and discussed how his side stuck to the game plan against the odds, in Paris.
“I think you’ve got to put the first 10 minutes behind you. Stick to the plan, obviously we were one man down and then they went one man down, so both teams had to adjust to that.
“We came in with the plan we wanted to play, we felt like we played a lot of rugby. We had a lot of attack in their half, just weren’t converting chances, and I think that was the main thing.”
Scotland were within one score in the closing stages of the game, having dragged the score-line to 25-21. With the clock in the red for the final play of the match, Scottish possession could have led to a dramatic victory. However France secured the ball, and were over to score through their veteran centre Gael Fickou.
Jones discussed this tough loss, as despite their hard work Scotland came away unsuccessful.
“We felt like we were chasing the game, maybe that got to us, I don’t know. Yeah, tough one, I thought we had that.
“We came here with a plan, and we wanted to stick to that plan. We wanted to get the ball wide and attack their backs. I think we stuck to that, we did well, it’s nice to get across the line, but yeah it would have been nice to get another one and win the game.”