Scotland coach Vern Cotter not considering changes for South Africa yet

World Rugby champions and #1-ranked team in the world, the New Zealand All Blacks cruised past Namibia 58-14 to remain as tournament favorites. We’re okay with that, we’re still looking at the content, the players pride themselves on improving.

“We settled down at half-time, we looked after our jobs, and we made sure we held onto the ball and caused them problems in the second half”.

“The most important thing is to look at the guys who can pull on the jersey next week, those that can’t, and we will definitely need to freshen up before we play South Africa”.

He said: “No disrespect to the teams we’ve just played but South Africa will be a totally different kettle of fish and we’ll need to be ready to go at the start of the game”.

“We just needed to settle down, it was a frustrating first half”. While Scotland is a fully professional team with all the players dedicating their careers to Rugby, the majority of the US side combine their training with a part-time job elsewhere.

By then, Scotland – sitting top of the pool with a maximum 10 points – may have sealed its spot in the quarterfinals, though that will require a victory over the Springboks in six days.

Hogg missed with another penalty attempt and within minutes the Americans had stormed down the pitch.

“After their opening game they’ve had a wake-up call”, said Sean Maitland, one of the five try-scorers in the 39-16 win over the US. Russell was now pulling the strings sweetly.

Nayacalevu, who also started in the World Cup opener against England, injured his right knee five minutes into the Wallabies Test. From a well worked passing move from a lineout Lamositele burrowed over – MacGinty adding the conversion for 10-6.

It was careless and showed a vulnerability which was compounded by the loss of lock Grant Gilchrist who limped off to be replaced by Tim Swinson.

Dan Biggar’s fifty metre penalty gave Wales the lead but there was definitely time for England to salvage something.

It was Scott’s first try in dark blue since he crossed against Italy in Pretoria on the summer tour of 2013 and he admitted he was itching to get his chance after watching Scotland toil in the first period against the feisty Americans.

Josh Strauss barged his way upfield and this time Hogg was inch-perfect with his pass out wide for Visser to score in the corner.

And by the 47th minute Scotland opened up clear daylight as Russell sniped through and offloaded to a supporting Maitland, who cantered over the whitewash.

MacGinty took the States to within two points with a penalty.

The Scots had upped the tempo noticeably and a charge down from created the field position for replacement Willem Nel to barge over before fellow substitute cut a superb line to score the bonus-point try.

25-16. Momentum had switched enough now for Scotland to turn down penalty kicks in favour of attacking lineouts, a policy that paid dividends when another replacement, Matt Scott, danced through to claim a four-try bonus point.