Van der Merwe record as Scots survive Uruguay scare
Scotland secure their fourth win in a row on foreign soil for the first time since 1927 – but are unconvincing 31-19 winners in Uruguay.
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Uruguay (14) 19
Tries: S Alvarez, Etcheverry, Diana Con: Etcheverry 2
Scotland (19) 31
Tries: Ashman, Crosbie, Van der Merwe, Harrison, Schoeman Con: Healy 2, Hastings
Scotland secured a fourth win in a row on foreign soil for the first time since 1927 but were unconvincing against Uruguay in Montevideo.
Tries from Ewan Ashman, Luke Crosbie and Duhan van der Merwe – his 28th for Scotland, which sets a new national record – gave Gregor Townsend’s side a comfortable early lead.
But tries from Santiago Alvarez and Filipe Etcheverry brought Uruguay to within five points at the break.
The hosts levelled after Manuel Diana crossed, but the Scots responded swiftly through Patrick Harrison and Pierre Schoeman to ease fears of a shock.
Both sides went into the game short of full strength, with Scotland fielding a side almost exclusively made up of Edinburgh and Glasgow Warriors players, while the hosts were missing some key performers who are in their Olympics Sevens squad.
It was Uruguay, smarting from last weekend’s heavy loss to Argentina, who came out the blocks faster.
They should have made early pressure tell, but fly-half Etcheverry pushed his penalty wide from an inviting position.
The Scots made them pay almost immediately, after Ben Healy’s monster kick from his own 22 took his side deep into the home half.
With his second touch from the resulting rolling maul, Ashman dived over and Healy added the extras off the tee.
Uruguay suffered a quickfire triple blow as Juan Bautista Hontou was forced out of the game with a knee injury, Diego Arbelo was sent to the sin bin and Matt Fagerson put flanker Crosbie through for Scotland’s second try.
Healy knocked over a simple conversion and Van der Merwe was soon touching down in the corner for his record-breaking try – the winger moving one ahead of Stuart Hogg after just 41 caps.
A loose Healy pass helped Uruguay back into the game as Alvarez cruised in under the posts before Etcheverry went over from close range and added his second conversion to make the score 19-14 at the break.
Diana burrowed over to draw the hosts level and only the latest of a series of missed kicks from Etcheverry prevented Uruguay taking a surprise lead.
That spurred Scotland into action and on the back of rolling mauls Harrison, with his first international try in his second appearance, and Schoeman went over and Healy added the conversions to restore their advantage.
That was enough to ensure Townsend’s side added to previous tour victories against Canada, United States and Chile at the end of a long season against a side who have now lose six of their latest seven outings.
Uruguay: I Alvarez, Bautista Hontou, Alonso, Inciarte, Freitas, Etcheverry, S Alvarez, Peculo, Pujadas, Arbelo, Aliaga, Leindekar Virginio, Ardao, Bianchi, Deus.
Replacements: Gini for Bautista Hontou (20). Not Used: Myszka, Sanguinetti, Piussi, Magno, Civetta, Diana, Suarez. Sin Bin: Arbelo (23).
Scotland: Paterson, Rowe, Jones, McDowall, Van Der Merwe, Healy, Horne, Sutherland, Ashman, Sebastian, Williamson, G. Brown, Crosbie, Darge, M. Fagerson.
Replacements: Steyn for Rowe (54), Hastings for Healy (54), Dobie for Horne (62), Schoeman for Sutherland (54), Harrison for Ashman (62), Walker for Sebastian (54), Johnson for G. Brown (69), Ritchie for Crosbie (62).
