Date: Saturday, November 21 Venue: Murrayfield Kick-off: 17.15 GMT Referee: Romain Poite (France)
“Nothing to lose, and much to gain,” is how Australian coach Robbie Deans summed up a Scotland side who he says will be difficult to beat at Murrayfield. Buttering up aside, Scotland do have the benefit of the inklings of momentum thanks to new coach Andy Robinson, who surely won’t take it as too much of a slight on his new tenure if his team are steamrolled by the Wallabies.
Join Robert Dawson Scott for live text commentary on Saturday from 17.00.
It is not possible to bring you live text commentary this afternoon for technical reasons.
The visitors’ hopes of a home nations Grand Slam were ended by a quality Irish side last weekend, who pinched a 20-20 draw in the last moments of the match. It was a deserved result which has taken Australia down a peg or two – say perhaps from invincible to world class.
Now the Aussies have paid the Scots the respect of fielding an almost unchanged side. Just last weekend's man of the match David Pocock sits the match out and will be replaced by George Deans at flanker.
Robinson has also paid his side a compliment in fielding the same side that trundled to a 20-13 win over Fiji last weekend. Mike Blair is off the substitutes bench because of injury. Rory Lawson moves up.
Last week the most impressive feature of the Scots play was the power-hitting in defence; whether that can be reproduced against the infamous handling of the Australians is a question that Scottish defence coach Graeme Steadman will be waiting with baited breath to find out. The Aussie forwards will seriously test the potential of Scotland’s forwards and you have to wonder if the strangely accurate 15% improvement that Robinson demanded after the Fiji match will be enough.
Scotland team: 15 Rory Lamont, 14 Sean Lamont, 13 Alex Grove, 12 Graeme Morrison, 11 Simon Danielli, 10 Phil Godman, 9 Chris Cusiter (c), 8 Johnnie Beattie, 7 John Barclay, 6 Alasdair Strokosch, 5 Alastair Kellock, 4 Nathan Hines, 3 Moray Low, 2 Ross Ford, 1 Allan Jacobsen.
Replacements: 16 Dougie Hall, 17 Kyle Traynor, 18 Jason White, 19 Richie Vernon, 20 Mike Blair, 21 Chris Paterson, 22 Nick De Luca.
Australia team: 15 Adam Ashley-Cooper, 14 Peter Hynes, 13 Digby Ioane, 12 Quade Cooper, 11 Drew Mitchell, 10 Matt Giteau, 9 Will Genia, 8 Wycliff Palu, 7 George Smith, 6 Rocky Elsom (c), 5 Mark Chisholm, 4 James Horwill, 3 Ben Alexander, 2 Stephen Moore, 1 Benn Robinson.
Replacements: 16 Tatafu Polota-Nau, 17 Sekope Kepu, 18 Dean Mumm, 19 Richard Brown, 20 Luke Burgess, 21 Ryan Cross, 22 James O'Connor.
