Hadden switches focus to Italy clash

Scotland head coach Frank Hadden admitted his side were outclassed in their 40-0 defeat to New Zealand but stressed the result was now history.

Scotland's focus now shifts to next Saturday's World Cup Pool C clash with Italy in St Etienne, which will decide whether the Scots or thr Azzurri qualify for the semi-finals.

"It was a tough afternoon, there's no doubt about it,'' Hadden told ITV1.

"The gulf in class was there for all to see.

"We didn't get off to the best of starts but I thought it was a pretty gutsy effort overall.

"We will be judged not on our performance today of course but on whether we qualify for the quarter-finals.''

Hadden added: "We can't spend more than a couple of minutes dwelling on what's happened.

"Let's look forward, we've got a tremendous opportunity to do something really special for the Scottish crowd in this competition.''

Hadden named an under-strength side to take on the All Blacks, who are tournament favourites, but denied he was short-changing the sell-out crowd at Murrayfield.

He explained that the benefits of resting several key men ahead of the Italy match could be huge, and beneficial for Scottish rugby on a long-term basis.

Hadden said: "The huge advantage we've got now is that instead of taking four or five days to recover, which might have been the case next week, we can train tomorrow and give us five days of quality build-up to the match which is going to ultimately decide how well we do in this competition."

Scotland's stand-in captain Scott Murray, leading the side while Jason White took a break, was full of praise for the efforts of his team-mates.

"They put their bodies on the line and you can't ask any more of them,'' he said.

"It's a young team, a lot of young boys, but they put everything they had into it.

"They put all their hearts into it and hopefully that'll rub off on the boys that are going to play Italy next week.''

Murray confirmed that the spirit in the Scotland camp is high, after their convincing opening wins over Portugal and Romania and a summer spent preparing for the tournament.

He told ITV1: "It's a great buzz we've got at the moment. There's a lot of competition for places and hopefully that'll spur us on to bigger and better things.''

Alasdair Dickinson made his Scotland debut in the match, and found it a gruelling experience.

He said: "I found it a tough game, a really physical game, but still a great occasion for me, to pull that blue jersey on. It was massively tough but I enjoyed it.''

The Gloucester prop nevertheless admitted that being beaten by 40 points could never be an enjoyable experience.

"That was a disappointing game, we did lose a fair few points, but we're not going to dwell on that,'' Dickinson told ITV1.

"We're just going to get back on the horse and go back out there and get a win next weekend.''

The Italy clash has an added edge to it.

Not only will it offer the chance for each team to secure a place in the last eight, but for Scotland the opportunity is there to avenge the RBS 6 Nations Championship defeat from earlier in the year, when the Azzurri produced a stunning performance in Edinburgh.

"We have to think back to the Six Nations and what happened,'' said Dickinson.

"We've got a little bit of a chip on our shoulder and it's definitely a key game for us, a massive game and we're going to go out there and give it everything.''