Scotland suffer baptism of fire on emotional Murrayfield occasion

A lot was made of how many England players were absent, but Scotland were also missing some talismanic figures. The gnarly number eight Evie Gallagher, powerful second row Sarah Bonar, classy centre Emma Orr, and the experienced and wily Lisa Thomson, to name a few. Eight players in Scotland's matchday squad had fewer than 10 caps, most of them on the bench.

The players themselves describe this as a "new team" under the stewardship of head coach Sione Fukofuka. As England brought on Sarah Bern, an 80-cap prop, and Marlie Packer, a 112-cap back-row, to score three tries between them, plus another two from replacements, Scotland toiled. That is not to say young players such as number eight Emily Coubrough and debutant Rianna Darroch did not show up well.

Just the scale of the task was too big for a team getting to grips with new faces and coaching. Other teams should be 'very worried' by England performance "I think it was a bit of inexperience across the board - we are all still learning each other," Malcolm told BBC Sport. "Today was a baptism of fire and they exposed our weaknesses.

This was a brilliant test for us but we hoped we would out in a better performance today. " Malcolm and Fukofuka both insisted the emotion of the occasion did not affect Scotland's performance, it was more about execution and their lack of aggression in defence. A total of 52 missed tackles adds credence to that.