Ryan Jones opens his Wales account.

Any fears of a Murrayfield re-awakening were easily brushed off, as Mike Ruddocks' side continued to reinforce their new standing in Northern Hemisphere rugby, with a dazzling display of trademark running rugby.

To avoid the obvious cliché, fifty minutes of Wales picking apart the sort of jigsaw aimed at toddlers, was followed by half an hour of desperate rugby when the hosts finally re-discovered the ability to carry out the most basic of rugby functions.

The red tide that had left Paris gaping, engulfed Edinburgh in a similarly thrilling style, with three tries inside the opening fifteen minutes. Ryan Jones delivered an early wake up call, finishing off the long distance effort he created from a break inside his half. A kamikaze pass allowed Rhys Williams acres of space to stretch his legs and and touch down in the eighteenth minute.

More diabolical tackling from the home side saw Shane Williams with the easiest of finishes following the softest of defensive slip ups that allowed Stephen Jones to go through untouched.

As if Wales's intentions were not obvious enough, as the simplest of Shanklin dummies enabled Kevin Morgan to cross for the first of his brace of tries, the second coming on the brink of half time after some paper tight defending allowed Dwayne Peel to give the Scottish defence the runaround, and Morgan was played into the corner, to compound the home sides misery at 38-3 down.

The second period saw the advantage forced home even more, after a simply mesmeric handling move between forwards and backs, a quick tap penalty taken by Dwayne Peel left both his own side and the Scots' stunned, but Rhys Williams was alert enough to receive a pass from the outstanding scrum half and dive over. The home side will undoubtedly feel aggrieved by the nature in which Peel took his tap despite a player being treated by a physio, however referee Kaplin did not intervene.

Welsh thoughts certainly turned to events in six days time, and began to ease off and Scotland began to show glimpses of potential, that had sorely been absent throughout the opening hour, with three well taken score of their own, and possibly they were unlucky not to get a fourth.

But the dream of a Welsh grand slam is so close to becoming reality at long last. Ireland will be desperately wanting to extract the same medicene handed to them by France at Lawnsdowne road, come next Saturday afternoon at 3.30, but I can hardly wait.

SCOTLAND 22
Scotland. Tries Craig, R Lamont, Paterson Cons
Paterson 2 Pen Paterson

WALES 46
Wales. Tries R Jones, R Williams 2, S Williams, Morgan
2 Cons S Jones 5 Pens S Jones 2

Scotland: Paterson; R Lamont, Craig (Henderson 76), Southwell, S Lamont; Parks (Ross 41), Cusiter (Blair 44); T Smith, Bulloch, Kerr (Douglas 41), Grimes (Hines 41), Murray, Taylor, Petrie, Hogg. Replacements: Russell, Dunbar

Wales: Morgan; R Williams (Luscombe 68), Shanklin, Henson (Sweeney 76), S Williams; S Jones, Peel; Jenkins, Davies (McBryde 50), A Jones (Yapp 63), Cockbain
(J Thomas 71), Sidoli, R Jones, M Williams, Owen. Replace-ments: Sowden-Taylor, Phillips Sin bin Cockbain (61)

Attendance 63,431

Editorial Team

Lestyn - Paul French - paulfrench_2002@hotmail.com
Zippy -