All Blacks quell Scottish rebellion

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Two fourth-quarter tries revived the All Blacks from a scoreless 50-minute slump as the tourists came back to deny Scotland a historic victory in Edinburgh on Sunday.

Late strikes from lock Scott Barrett and wing Mark Telea sparked the New Zealand fightback for a 31-23 victory at Murrayfield. Scotland put in a brave performance to dig themselves out of an early 14-point deficit, scoring 23 unanswered points for a 23-14 lead after 53 minutes.

But the All Blacks fullback Jordie Barrett kicked a penalty to snap the visitors’ dry spell, Scotland lost Jack Dempsey to a yellow card, and the tourists kicked into high gear to race away for the win.

The visitors looked set to cruise to a 30th win in 32 meetings between the sides when they raced into a 14-0 lead after just seven minutes thanks to tries from Samisoni Taukei’aho and Telea.

Stuart Hogg hit out at his critics for concentrating too much on his appearance rather than his rugby this week and the Exeter full-back produced the moment of magic needed to get Murrayfield off their feet.

A penalty try was awarded and a yellow card shown to Anton Lienert-Brown for a tackle off the ball after Hogg looked favourite to collect his chip and chase into the in-goal area.

Scotland took just two minutes to level thanks to another Kiwi error as Darcy Graham intercepted David Havili’s intended pass to Beauden Barrett and just had the speed to evade Caleb Clarke and Jordie Barrett to the line.

Russell’s vision and Hogg’s speed teed up Graham to cross over once more in the corner, but the Edinburgh wing had just placed one foot into touch.

Scotland were left to rue more missed opportunities either side of half-time as they were penalised three times by Irish referee Frank Murphy on the New Zealand line.

But Russell’s goal-kicking was flawless as three penalties put Scotland 23-14 ahead.

New Zealand had barely been inside the Scottish 22 for the first 20 minutes of the second half, but Ian Foster’s replacements had the desired effect for the three-time world champions.

Jordie Barrett reduced the arrears to six with a penalty before it was Scotland’s turn to cope with 14 men for 10 minutes.

Dempsey was shown a yellow card for a deliberate knock-on with New Zealand hammering on the door beneath the Scottish posts.

The All Blacks wasted no time in making the man advantage count as Scott Barrett muscled his way over the line.

His brother Jordie added the extras and with 14 minutes left, New Zealand had their first lead since the blistering opening quarter of an hour.

Telea then made sure of a sixth consecutive win for New Zealand since losing six times in eight Tests either side of the turn of the year.

© Agence France-Presse


Photo: David Rogers/Getty Images

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Rienk De Beer