Scotland wins Douglas Horn Trophy in Canada’s Men’s Rugby Team’s return to home soil

Canada’s Men’s Rugby Team took on Scotland at TD Place in Ottawa on Saturday night, with Scotland retaining the Douglas JL Horn Memorial Cup with a 73-12 win. Lucas Rumball and Kyle Baillie scored for Canada, with six Canadians earning their first caps in front of a crowd of 11,447, the largest TD Place has seen for an international test match rugby.

Canada got off to a strong start, with well executed lineouts and sustained ball possession. Captain Lucas Rumball scored off a maul to give Canada an early 5-0 lead.

Scotland responded quickly however, converting their try to go up 7-5. The Scots scored three more, and while Canada rallied together to put the pressure on Scotland in the final minutes of the first half, Scotland kept their 24-5 lead going into half-time.

The second half started with another Scottish try, but Kyle Baillie got Canada on the board once more, picking the ball up on the back of a ruck and forcing his way over the line. Peter Nelson kicked a good conversion to bring the score to 31-12 for Scotland.

With three more tries, Scotland went up 52-12. With 15 minutes remaining, Canada’s backs held up the ball on a close scoring attempt, but Scotland scored another three, giving them a final win of 73-12.

“We needed possession. We need a good lineout, a good ball and a good defence for Canada. We need to improve in those areas in the next five days,” said Head Coach Kingsley Jones. “The set pieces you’ve got to be really pleased with and other aspects, the attitude of the players. There’s six new caps, it’s the start of something special for those guys. The start was good. We controlled possession and there’s positives there for us. But the players are pretty devastated, the staff as well. It’s hard, we want to win. We talk about it, but the reality is today, without the ball we weren’t good enough. It’s difficult for all of us, we really want to do better. The scoreline in the end is pretty disappointing. The next five days is about fixing what we see from that.”

Six players earned their first cap for Canada, with Nic Benn starting at number 11 and Brock Gallagher, James Stockwood, Jesse Mackail, Talon McMullin and Takoda McMullin (the 500th men’s player to earn a cap for Canada) entering the game in the second half.  

Scotland’s Harry Paterson was named Player of the Match, and received art designed by Connor nidijinikaz, Nandotawa Tibikad, Pikwàkanagàn nindondjiba, makwa nidodem, an artist from the Algonquins of Pikwàkanagàn First Nation.

Canada’s Men’s Rugby Team returns to the pitch at TD Place on Friday July 12 at 7:00pm ET / 4:00pm PT to take on Romania. Tickets are available for purchase at rugby.ca/en/tickets. Questions regarding ticket purchases can be directed to tickets@rugby.ca. For more information on suites, please contact suites@rugby.ca.  

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