England far too strong for Scotland

England ran in 12 tries in a crushing of Scotland, who just couldn’t match the power and pace of the home side.

Tries came for England from captain Sarah Hunter, Ceri Large, Sally Tuson, Abigail Chamberlain, Hannah Gallagher, Amber Reed, Kay Wilson and Rochelle Clark.

It was a slow enough start from both sides but Scotland’s early defence was excellent for 19 minutes, replling a number of England attacks and with some massive tackles from the likes of Susie Brown and Lindsay Wheeler.

England finally broke the deadlock through Hunter who dived over after 19 minutes after some good offloading buildup to take a 5-0 lead.

That was all of the momentum England needed and soon after the floodgates opened.

Saracens flanker Hannah Gallagher spotted a gap in the Scottish defence and slid through with ease for try number two Amber Reed added the extras, before she scored herself and converted again. There was time for England to add a fourth try before the break, wing Kay Wilson turned on the afterburners to run in from just over half way to make it 24-0.

After the break fly half Ceri Large showed good feet to get over the line before Abi Chamberlain exploited a gap in the Scottish defence to go over for her first international try to make it 38-0.  Minutes later and Chamberlain had her second and then replacement wing Sally Tuson showed good pace and strength to get over and the ninth followed soon after, Ceri Large again going over the line after some sustained pressure from the home side.

For the tenth try the ball worked its way towards the forwards and replacement prop Rochelle Clark burrowed over to score. Hunter then scored her second try as the clock ticked 70 to make it 69-0 and Tuson got her second minutes later to make it 76-0 after Reed’s conversion, rounding off the scoring.

England head coach Gary Street said: "For the first ten or fifteen minutes as we were bedding into the game we did make mistakes but the important thing was that we didnt panic, we got it together and in the end the result clearly went our way.

"We had a lot of young, inexperienced players out there today but actually they were all leaders and they stood up and that's something I'm really pleased with. We want our games to be exciting to watch, so when people do tune in on television or come to see us live they get a great experience, and that's what we managed today."