Jack Dempsey has admitted that Scotland struggled to come to terms with Georgia in the first half of Saturday’s Rugby World Cup warm-up match at Murrayfield, calling the game one of the more frustrating in which he had played. But the Glasgow Warriors No 8 believes that the way his team recovered after the break from 6-0 down to win 33-6 augurs well for the tournament, which begins for them with a match against world champions South Africa a week on Sunday.
The Georgia match was the fourth successive occasion on which Scotland found themselves behind at half-time, but it was also the third time out of the four that they came back to win following home victories over Italy and France. And although they lost to France away, Dempsey is confident that the squad have learned a lot from playing different styles of opponents over the summer, and believes they are ready to face up to the challenge of playing the Springboks.
“It was actually quite a frustrating game, to be fair,” he said. “Now we can laugh about it, but it was one of the more frustrating games I’ve played in.
“In the first half, I think we just overplayed our hand. There was just so much space out there that we got a bit greedy - instead of trying to go forward and through Georgia to set up the backs, we just went wide early.
“In the end, we came back. We got a rev-up at half-time, similar to the home game against France, and we fought back with our fitness. We got there in the end.
“Each of the four games has presented us with a different sort of challenge - we’ve met it head-on and been largely successful. That has to be a positive heading into a World Cup, because you never know what’s going to come your way.
‘Now all the distractions are out of the way. We’ve got South Africa next up and we know there’s no hiding. We feel like we are prepared now. All our focus is on that game and we go into it all guns blazing.”
Scotland will need to do exactly that against opponents who were in formidable form at Twickenham on Friday night, inflicting a record 35-7 defeat on arch-rivals New Zealand. “I think they made a statement to show everyone they should be favourites, defending champions as they are,” added Dempsey, who played for his native Australia at the last World Cup before observing the required three-year stand-down then qualifying for Scotland through a grandparent.
“I thought it was an absolute clinic. They’ve got to be one of the deepest teams in world rugby. I’m not going to lie, I think they made a statement to show everyone they should be favourites, defending champions as they are.”
Having said that, Dempsey insisted that, rather than becoming obsessed with stopping their opponents, Scotland had to focus primarily on getting their own best game out onto the pitch. “I think it’s irrelevant for us in terms of the opposition. Our biggest enemy is ourselves.
“If you look at the game against Georgia, we were a different team in the second half. When we’re on, we’ve got to be one of the most electrifying and exciting teams in the world, but also we deliver and we’re clinical. But then the flip side is the Jekyll and Hyde story.
“For us, it’s just about putting the pressure on in training. The Springboks defence is going to test us in a way we don’t get tested in the Six Nations, because no-one really defends like that. But we’re looking forward to it.”
