Borders trio Hogg, Laidlaw and Graham crash to defeat in Japan

The world number one side dominated and ran out convincing 27-3 winners in Yokohama on Sunday morning UK time, with head coach Gregor Townsend admitting after the game that they lacked energy and aggression from the start against Joe Schmidt’s side.

Hogg said afterwards they were “battered”.

Greig Laidlaw opened the Scots’ account with a penalty, but by then the Irish had already built up a healthy lead after scoring two tries in the opening 15 minutes. A third soon followed despite Hogg’s best efforts as he was pushed under the posts and the resulting scrum saw Furlong crash over the line all in the opening 25 minutes.

A fourth try seemed inevitable but did not arrive until after the break through Conway as Ireland earned the bonus point.

Scotland will be hoping for much better when they face Samoa on Monday in Pool A – a must win clash if they harbour any ambitions of qualifying from the group.