It’s been a very long time since the Scots have won in Cardiff and after comprehensively taking apart the Welsh to lead 27-0 at half-time you can agree with the Kiwi’s reflection wholeheartedly.
Scores from prop Pierre Schoeman, a double from wing Duhan van der Merwe including a splendid individual long-range effort and 12 points from the boot of Finn Russell showing the Scots were in no mood to carry on their Welsh hoodoo in the capital that stretched back 22 years.
After 11 defeats on the trot in the Principality, Gregor Townsend’s men would come away with the victory, but Gatland would be scratching his head how two halves of rugby can be so different.
Wales’ rousing second-half performance though almost produced the greatest comeback in Six Nations history with a gripping 40 minutes packed with four tries and two Scottish yellow cards.
James Botham, Rio Dyer, Aaron Wainwright and Alex Mann all scoring in a breathless spell.
First flanker Botham would score from a driving maul minutes after the restart as Scottish ill-discipline would galvanise the home side. Hooker George Turner sent to the sin bin for his role in collapsing the ball when Wales were moving to the try line with Wales likely to have been awarded a penalty try.
With the extra man Wales would spread the play with Dragons wing Rio Dyer racing onto replacement Scrum-half Tomos Williams’ arching pass to go over in the corner to the satisfaction of a Cardiff crowd. The decibels inside the intimidating Principality Stadium deafening with the smell of a comeback on the horizon.
No sooner had the visitors been restored to full quota, discipline issues struck once more. Centre Sione Tuipulotu caving under Welsh pressure to be the latest to see his temporary marching orders.
With the extra man Dragons hooker Elliot Dee’s quick thinking with a tap and go from the resulting penalty would see regional teammate Aaron Wainwright dive under the posts.
Shell-shocked, the Scots would face a barrage of one-way traffic as the sea of red shirts would pile forward into the Scottish twenty-two resulting in a fourth Welsh try.
Debutant flanker Alex Mann bursting free from the driving maul to dive over. The Cardiff man’s try and added conversion by Scarlets Ioan Lloyd closing the Welsh to within a solitary point of a monumental turnaround.
There would be no fairytale, however, as whilst Wales would huff and puff at the flailing Scottish defence, but they would not be able to breach it one last time to secure an unlikely victory.
Townsend and his players relief would be plain to see etched all over their faces as the final whistle blew, whilst Gatland would be left ruing his sides first-half horror show.
“I think I can apologise for the first half, it’s probably the worst first 40-minute performance in my whole rugby career as a coach.
“We were terrible, shocking. The Discipline was so poor, we didn’t nail some things, so the message at half-time was to do what we wanted to do in the first-half, bring some tempo, play with a bit of intensity and play some rugby, nothing flashy.
“I think some guys came off the bench and had some impact, we were so slow though in the first-half on things like opportunities for quick taps to get us back in the game.
“When you don’t nail some lineouts and give away stupid penalties – the Josh Adams one was dumb and when you think about it, that’s the difference between winning and losing the game.
“The players should be disappointed with the first-half but proud of the second half and could have won the game.
“To do what we did, be 27-0 down, other teams might have shown less character and start thinking about next week, even throw in the towel.
“We didn’t do that. They kept fighting and put themselves in a position to win. That showed real character”
[Lead image Welsh Rugby Union]
