No more Worryfield

WALES arrived in Scotland for the fourth leg of their Grand Slam bid as overwhelming favourites and with the backing of over 40,000 countryman drowning out the home support.

But Murrayfield had been the graveyard of their hopes many times before and to many it seemed the slipperiest of banana skins.

For once, however, things went totally as expected and indeed the Scots seemed keener than anyone to pave the way for a Welsh victory.

They allowed Newport-born Ryan Jones to barge through the proverbial barn door to set up a third-minute try which he was on hand to finish off via superb support play from Kevin Morgan, Gethin Jenkins and Martyn Williams.

Then Dan Parks, surely the worst outside half to have worn the dark blue shirt, decided that a three or four-man overlap and the perfect opportunity to level matters would spoil Wales' party, so he three out a gift pass which Rhys Williams gratefully intercepted for a length-of-the-field try.

And in the 13th minute Wales outside half Stephen Jones realised that even with his lack of pace, a huge gap between two forwards was enough for him to get through and he did so to set up a try via a superb pass to Shane Williams by Michael Owen. It was fluent offloading, handling and running by Wales, but really the Scottish side were a shambles and at 21-0 the game was already over, though the gifts hadn't ended.

Jones added a penalty for 24-0 and then Tom Shanklin burst through a barely attempted tackle by Sean Lamont and the increasingly impressive Kevin Morgan, a superb counter-attacker in the great Welsh traditions, was on hand to complete the move for a try Jones again converted.

The mayhem continued when scrum half and man-of-the-match Dwayne Peel not only had time to fumble the ball backwards from a scrum but to recover and run around the other side to find another massive gap which he exploited for Morgan to once again supply the finishing touch.

With the conversion it was 38-3 at half time and what was to prove a record Welsh win on Scottish soil seemed likely to become the biggest win by one home nation over another in Five or Six Nations history.

That seemed to be confirmed when Peel caught Scotland napping (or had they simply not woken up from their first half slumbers) with a quick tap as prop Tom Smith was receiving attention, to put Rhys Williams over for his second try.

But then, all of a sudden, the rout was over.

Scotland's half time replacement of Parks by Gordon Ross and lock Stuart Grimes by Nathan Hines plus the replacement three minutes later of Chris Cusiter by Mike Blair transformed them.

Cusiter a British Lions prospect?

Don't make me laugh. I've seen better in the Welsh Premier Division. Blair was an immense improvement with his pace and speed of pass and Ross far more tactically astute than Parks.

And this time Scotland were helped by under pressure South African referee Jonathan Kaplan, savagely criticised by England for two crucial decisions against Ireland, who waved the yellow card at Wales lock Brent Cockbain for going into a ruck on the Scottish line from the side.

Centre Andy Craig swept over for a try full back Chris Paterson converted from the touchline, then wing Rory Lamont exposed Shane Williams' defensive limitations, as had the French previously, by barging through his and Shanklin's feeble attempted tackles to score.

And then they launched a thrilling counter-attack after Wales replacement Hal Luscombe had failed to take a low pass at full stretch at the other end, for Patterson to gather a chip ahead and score.

In between times Jones had kicked a second Wales penalty, but the Scots appeared unlucky not to be awarded a fourth try by the French video referee who ruled Hines had been held up over the line when the television pundits felt he had grounded the ball properly.

Whatever, it had been a thrilling Scottish fightback but an even more thrilling Welsh opening forty minutes and all that remains is for Wales to complete the most thrilling of revivals with a Grand Slam victory over Ireland this weekend.

And then a completely new generation, many not born in 1978 when Wales last won all their championship games, will be able to say "we were there."