Gregor Townsend insists the pain of Scotland’s Six Nations defeat in Dublin will make them stronger in the long run.
For the first time in the Six Nations era, Scotland went into the final day with a chance of winning the championship.
But they were soundly beaten by an Ireland team who won the Triple Crown, only to miss out on the title courtesy of France’s thrilling late win over England in Paris.
Townsend admitted that his team simply weren’t good enough on the day, as his personal record against Ireland extended to 12 matches without a win.
However, with 18 months left to run on his contract, the Scotland head coach claimed he is hungrier than ever to deliver success.
‘We’re going to get Ireland in the Six Nations next year and in the World Cup,’ he reflected. ‘We just have to be better. That’s really it.
Gregor Townsend wants his Scotland team to learn from their final-day defeat in Dublin
Scotland’s Blair Kinghorn and Finn Russell gather their thoughts after losing 43-21 to Ireland
Ireland will be a tough proposition for Scotland in the next Six Nations and in the World Cup
‘They’re a quality side. I can’t remember what the record is at the Aviva against any team, but I think they went unbeaten for maybe four or five years at home.
‘We know that it’s one of the toughest challenges. This was always going to be the hardest game, and Ireland deserved to win on the day.
‘We’re a different team than we were 12 months ago or two years ago. Ireland are a different team, so it’s easy to go: “Yeah, it’s the same issues”.
‘No, we just didn’t play at our best on Saturday. We certainly did all we could in that third quarter to get the game back but Ireland just were more accurate in the end to get the win.
‘I think the team knows that, when they’re able to get certain areas of the game right, they can be a match for anybody.
‘We’ve played some top teams in this tournament, and obviously the level of performance (in the victory) against France was at a very high level, an extreme level.
‘But that should give the players confidence, no matter who they play. You have to go through the hard work to get the outcomes and you have to go through the defeats, too.
‘We have no right to win any game of rugby. No team does and sometimes those lessons when you lose are painful but they make you a stronger team. That’s what we have found from the Argentina defeat in the autumn.
‘This was going to be painful because it’s the last game of the campaign, so there’s nothing we can do about it on training on Monday.
‘But we have Argentina and the Springboks as our next two opponents in the summer so we will take a lot out of this game to make us a better team.’
Scotland’s Six Nations had started with huge questions over Townsend’s future after the defeat to Italy in Rome on the opening day.
That followed a poor campaign in the autumn as well as major scrutiny over Townsend’s consultancy role with Red Bull.
However, he engineered a major turnaround to win three matches – against England, Wales and France – which secured a third-placed finish, despite the disappointment of failing to land a blow on Ireland on the final day.
It has been a campaign of some progress from where Scotland were only a few weeks ago, albeit they still look a long way short of actually winning a Six Nations championship.
Insisting that he still has the hunger to carry on for another 18 months, Townsend said: ‘Absolutely, I feel hugely privileged to be in this role.
‘Coming off the field at Rome in a monsoon and speaking to the players, I knew we had another opportunity there the following week against England.
‘It’s disappointing because we didn’t get our best performance against Ireland. We didn’t get that third quarter performance for 10 or 15 minutes longer.
‘But I was really proud of seeing that performance and knowing that this team has what it takes. Of course, after a defeat, it’s hard to give that real credibility.
‘But, on the back of what we’ve done, and on the back of that 20-25 minute period on Saturday, we know what’s required. The challenge is going to be to deliver on that, especially against top sides.’
Townsend will now begin his planning for the World Cup in Australia in 18 months’ time and will travel there next month to start laying out a roadmap.
Scotland will face Ireland, Uruguay and Portugal, and know that there’s a potential clash with France in the last 16.
‘Yes, I’m going out there at the end of April,’ said Townsend. ‘I think we’ve got a two-week slot, a ten-day slot, to consider the other teams and that’s going to come into sharp focus.
‘We know what we’re going to do for the World Cup warm-up wise, our games and our training camp, but then this will be around venues, choosing venues and obviously Melbourne, Perth and Brisbane.
‘There’s an excitement there, but I know who’s in our World Cup pool [Ireland]. We also know who we might play in the last 16, too.
‘It’s teams that we’re coming up against and have already come up against in this championship, but we also could be coming up against them in the summer.
‘So there’s a World Cup context in all those contests, and obviously last week against France was a real step forward in terms of what a World Cup game could look like against those top teams.
‘On Saturday the reality is that, if you don’t get it right, it’s going to be tough to beat a top side.’