The Pool A game between Scotland and Samoa promises to be an interesting affair as the Rugby World Cup continues today. Scotland is coming off a comprehensive 27-3 defeat to Ireland and Samoa have had a taste of success after a convincing 34-9 victory against minnows Russia.
Samoa has also lost two of their key players, center Rey Lee-Lo and top hooker Motu Matu’u to three-match suspensions. In addition to the suspended players, Samoa is in further trouble with injuries to four of their players who played in the win against Russia, this will no doubt serve to dampen their momentum, which they will need to defeat a quality team like Scotland.
Some good news for Samoa though is that their skipper Jack Lam is back in the team after recovering from injury. Scotland has also made some changes to their team after the defeat to 2nd rank Ireland, their entire back row has been changed with Magnus Bradbury, Jamie Ritchie and Blade Thomson coming in for John Barclay, the injured Hamish Watson, and Ryan Wilson.
See the full team rosters below as released by Coaches Gregory Townsend (Scotland) and Steve Jackson (Samoa).
SCOTLAND
SAMOA
Samoa have struggled against Scotland in previous encounters. The Teams have played a total of 11 test matches, with Scotland winning an impressive 9, 1 was drawn and Samoa has won only 1. In Rugby World Cups, the teams have met 3 times, with Scotland winning on all 3 occasions, the last time they met was at the Rugby World Cup in New Castle in 2015.
Scotland has a perfect track record against non-tier one opponents at Rugby World Cups- they have won all of their 20 encounters against such opposition. Samoa, on the other hand, has not fared as well against their stronger tier 1 rivals winning only 5 of their 19 games, the last victory coming way back in 1999 when they defeated Wales.
This is an extremely important game for both teams in the context of their World Cup aspirations. The match begins at 19:15 local time on Monday, September 30, 2019, at the Kobe Misaki Stadium.