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Last Updated: Sunday, 26 February 2006, 09:15 GMT
Chris Cusiter column

Chris Cusiter
Scotland scrum-half

I feel as high as a kite and it will take a while to sink in that we have beaten England, the reigning world champions.

It just seems so surreal. I've never won anything tangible playing for Scotland, and, up until the France game, I had never beaten any of the bigger teams.

Now we've beaten England to lift the Calcutta Cup. That's something tangible.

The win is something that will be remembered for a long time, and that's what makes it all the more special.

Chris Cusiter holds the Calcutta Cup
Winning helps prove a few people wrong and gives us a real belief that we can compete at the top

Just like the France game, we had a couple of minutes to run the clock down, and it seemed like the whistle would never blow.

When I finally got the ball, I just made sure I kicked it out as high as possible. There was a massive feeling of relief, followed by great joy.

In the past, games have gone away from us in the last 20 minutes, but I just had total faith that we would not miss a tackle and that the boys were going to keep them out.

There's a great amount of belief in the camp and I'm just so proud of everyone. They played so well.

We defended superbly to deny England a try. Maybe we would have liked to score one of our own. But, when you beat England, any score will do.

Conditions were not ideal, but I think we just played better than England did.

We stuck to our game-plan pretty well and put a lot of pressure on them.

There's always the possibility of giving a penalty away when you are defending that desperately at the end, but we had a six-point cushion and they had to score a try.

It was the best atmosphere I've ever experienced at Murrayfield and makes you so proud to be Scottish

Winning helps prove a few people wrong and gives us a real belief that we can compete at the top.

Perhaps we had a bit of an inferiority complex in recent years, but I think we have proved in the last two games at Murrayfield that this is a hard place to come and get a result.

Of course, the crowd played their part. It was the best atmosphere I've ever experienced at Murrayfield and makes you so proud to be Scottish.

Now we have two away games. Last time we were on the road, against Wales, we didn't do that well.

But it will be another tough game. Ireland had a poor first half against France, but they have lots of talent and gave a glimpse of what they are capable of with their late fightback.

Obviously, I would like to start that game rather than come on from the bench.

But this is a real squad effort and I'm grateful for the 20 minutes I got in such a special win over England.




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