Having finished 12th in the IRB World Series for 2013-14, Scotland were by no means amongst the frontrunners for medals going into the rugby sevens at the Commonwealth Games.
The likes of New Zealand, England, Australia and South Africa were expected to battle it out for a place on the podium, while fellow Commonwealth nations Canada, Kenya, Samoa and Wales also finished above the Scots in the World Series.
However, a spirited display against the All Blacks in the group stages, when they came within four points of becoming the first team to ever beat New Zealand at the Commonwealths, raised hopes that they could be spurred on to success at Ibrox by the home crowd.
That didn’t materialise, however, as a defeat to South Africa in the medal quarter-finals was followed by another loss at the hands of England in the plate semis to end their participation in the home Games.
The England game saw Scotland fall 19 points behind before fighting back to come within a whisker of claiming the victory, and it was a case of the same old story as the hosts had also fallen narrowly short of comebacks against the All Blacks and the Springboks.
“We’ve struggled all weekend. We’ve given teams too much at the start and tried to come back into it in the second half. In the second half [of the England game] we just left it too late,” Scotland back Scott Wight told Sports Mole.
“We gave ourselves hard work from the start – going 19-0 down is a big ask against one of the top four teams in the world. We came out and did play better in the second half, the crowd started to get behind us, but in the end we’ve fallen short.”
Ibrox was a cacophony of noise during the match against England, with plenty of support for both teams as another chapter was written in the long and storied rivalry between the two nations.
However, while matches against the auld enemy are guaranteed to create an electric atmosphere, Wight admitted that defeat hurt that little bit more at the hands of the English.
“You don’t like losing any game, regardless who it is. It probably compounds it even more when it is England. We spoke about it, all the fans who have been absolutely fabulous over the two days. It’s nice to see the sport getting so much support, but we’ve come up short,” he added.
“For them, they’ve come out tonight to hopefully see us play in two games and unfortunately we’ve only played the one. We’ve just done the lap of honour, and they showed massive appreciation. Everybody was off their seat the whole way round, so a big thanks to them over the whole weekend.
“When you’re 19-0 down and you score a try, the crowd do lift you. It is massive – we get our energy burst from the crowd. As I said they’ve been fabulous over this weekend and unfortunately we came up short.”
Despite the disappointment on the rugby field, the Commonwealth Games have been kind to Scotland so far and, while Wight has enjoyed the experience, he admitted that it was a shame not to have contributed to the host nation’s success.
“We went in last Sunday, and the village has been brilliant. Being part of it with all other sports has been fabulous, but when the other teams are having so much success, you want to have success as well,” he added.
“Unfortunately it hasn’t worked out that way today. We spoke about it earlier today – we wanted a medal and thought we had a good enough squad to get a medal, but we’ve come up short in two games today, which isn’t really acceptable.”
The rugby sevens gold medal will be decided when New Zealand take on South Africa in the final tonight.
Interview: Scotland rugby sevens back Scott Wight
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