Scotland head coach Gregor Townsend was pleased with the assertiveness his players showed in their dominant 44-10 victory over Georgia.
Centre Rory Hutchinson scored two tries on his first start for Gregor Townsend’s side, as Greig Laidlaw added a further 15 points with three penalties and three conversion.
Ben Toolis, Darcy Graham and Scott Cummings also crossed the line to create a serious conundrum for Townsend, who must select his provisional 31-man World Cup squad on Tuesday, with Matt Fagerson also impressing.
“It was a focussed performance with a lot of aggression,” said Townsend.
“We chipped away at the scoreboard through penalties, and when the game opened up a little bit I thought some of our attack play and support play was excellent.
“We knew we’d be tested in defence around the ruck area, our lineout maul and the scrum and while there’s areas to improve there I felt that was a big step up. Our attack game got going, but I still think we could do things a bit better.”
After Toolis and Hutchinson crossed early to help Scotland into a 20-0 lead, Georgia slowly came back into the game towards the end of the first half, with Soso Matiashvili converting a penalty to reduce the deficit.
They were stopped in their tracks only a short while later, as Laidlaw kept up his 100 per cent kicking record with a late first-half penalty.
In the second half, Hutchinson continued where he left off in the first by scoring a second try just five minutes after the break with Finn Russell pulling the strings.
Milton Haig’s side did not give up however, as they kept pushing and were finally rewarded with 25 minutes to go with Karlen Asieshvili barging his way through for a try.
Scotland responded though, and Russell played in Graham with a clever grubber for one try before Cummings powered over from close range late on.
