Hawick's Stuart Hogg inspires Scotland to first Twickenham win for almost 40 years

Scotland captain Hogg, 28, confounded the form book by leading Scotland to victory today, February 6, for the first time since 1983, following in the footsteps of former Gala captain Jim Aitken.

The Exeter Chiefs player’s team marked the 150th anniversary of the oldest rivalry in rugby by beating England 11-6 in their opening match of this year’s Six Nations championship to claim their first victory at the London stadium since 1983.

This was a victory as much forged in the south west of England and South Africa as the south of Scotland, though, as the only try of the game was scored by Duhan Van Der Merwe to give the visitors an 8-6 half-time lead.

Finn Russell was also inspirational despite being yellow-carded for a trip on Ben Youngs, and his performance will have been noted by British and Irish Lions coach Warren Gatland, watching from the stands.

Cameron Redpath, earning his first cap for Scotland, made an instant impression, catching a lineout throw and running straight into the midst of the English defence on one occasion, for instance.

Two long-distance balls from Hogg kept the reigning champions pinned back late on, but he couldn’t score a long-range penalty which would have put his side eight points ahead.

Happily for him, however, that didn’t matter as he and his team-mates had already done enough to make Gala hero Gregor Townsend the first Scottish coach since former Hawick High School headteacher Jim Telfer to win the Calcutta Cup at Twickenham.

Interviewed on ITV afterwards, Hogg said: “It’s amazing for us.

"We can’t repeat what’s happened in the past – that’s gone – but we’re very much in control of what can happen in the future, and we’ve said that and we believed in each other from the very beginning and, to a man, they were outstanding today.”