And he knows that as defending champions, his side are the team to beat and that brings with it its own pressures. He said: “Everyone will want to beat us but you can’t shy away from that. Our goals are to improve and get better in the coming seasons.Â
“People will expect and the Welsh public will be right to do so. We’ve put the pride back in the jersey but now it’s all about putting in performances.”Â
Last season, Gatland transformed Wales to his first four months in charge. Then the dragons became the only northern hemisphere outfit to take a southern hemisphere scalp with a stunning triumph over Australia in November.Â
But Gatland has warned his Six Nations rivals that the best is still yet to come from his men. “We over-achieved last year but we’ve also continued to develop as a team. Now we want to kick on in the Six Nations,” he said.
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“I told the players after the Autumn series that New Zealand, South Africa and Australia will always be world-class and difficult to beat.Â
“But between now and the next World Cup in 2011, there’s not huge areas of improvement for them to do in their game. But for us, there’s so much more to come.”
Scotland: H Southwell, S Webster, B Cairns, G Morrison, S Lamont, P Godman, M Blair [capt], A Jacobsen, R Ford, G Cross, J White, C Hamilton, A Hogg, J Barclay, S TaylorReplacements: D Hall, A Dickinson, K Brown, S Gray, C Cusiter, C Paterson, T Evans
Wales: L Byrne, L Halfpenny, T Shanklin, J Roberts, S Williams, S Jones, M Phillips, G Jenkins, M Rees, A Jones, I Gough, A Jones, R Jones, M Williams [capt], A Powell
Replacements: H Bennett, J Yapp, L Charteris, D Jones, D Peel, J Hook, A Bishop
Referee: Alain Rolland (Ireland
