Meryl Smith praises Scotland's 'clinical' improvement

By Megan Armitage

Player of the Match Meryl Smith believes that Scotland have finally found their 'clinical edge' following a dream end to their 2023 TikTok Women's Six Nations campaign.

The 21-year-old centre helped fire Scotland to a 36-10 victory over Ireland in front of a record-breaking crowd of over 4,862 at the DAM Health Stadium in Edinburgh.

Smith was an integral part of the Scotland squad sealed back-to-back victories for the first time in 17 years following their 29-21 win over Italy last week, notching the opening score for her team before a series of daring line breaks opened the door for Leah Bartlett to crash over in the second half.

And after two emotional and historic victories, the centre expressed her pride in the team for finally clinching a fourth-place finish.

"It's been an amazing atmosphere here in Edinburgh, the crowd has really lifted the team," said Smith. "We had a tough start, but the home support, the energy, it's so loud you can barely hear each other on the pitch.

"We've definitely been building week on week, and we're excited to see where we can go next. The last few years we've been so close; this year, we've found the clinical edge."

Scotland boss Bryan Easson was over-the-moon with his team's determination as they roared back in a bruising second half against Ireland on Super Saturday to clinch the final win of their campaign.

Heading into the break with a narrow 5-3 lead over the visitors, Scotland had to change things around if they wanted to pull off a convincing win in Edinburgh.

And convincing they were, as Easson's squad battled to a further five tries, including young winger Francesca McGhie's first-ever international score.

"I thought second half they were relentless - they just stuck at it," said Easson.

"We said at half time we had a couple of chances, but we gave the ball a bit too cheaply.

"Second half, we said get our attacking positions better, squeeze them and they would break, and I was really pleased with that second-half performance.

"I thought we were a bit more direct in the second half and some excellent finishes."

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