Saturday’s RBS 6 Nations meeting of Scotland and England at Murrayfield ended in a draw as neither side could manage a try in a less than attractive 15-15 stalemate.
England substitute Toby Flood was inches from winning the Calcutta Cup for Martin Johnson’s side with a late drop goal attempt from inside the Scotland half. But the effort rebounded off the padding underneath the post and Scotland claimed their first point of the championship as England’s hopes of winning it took what is surely a fatal blow.
Scotland made the perfect start after Dan Cole was called for not realising and Dan Parks sent a 40m penalty over straight down the middle.
England were getting plenty of stick from the home crowd as they failed to gel and furnish anything creatively and every mistake they made was pounced on by the hissers.
Wilkinson eventually dragged them level with the easiest of kicks from in front of the posts after the Scottish forwards lost their feet, but Parks soon had the Scots three up again.
Then came a big moment for Wilkinson. Euan Murray was adjudged to have brought down the scrum and from a long way out the England legend surpassed the 1,100 international points mark, overtaking Ireland’s Ronan O’Gara once again.
Yet his side let him down as they trailed once more at the break. Parks had already missed one drop goal effort, but he knocked over his next attempt from play after a slow and insipid build-up, the Scots leading the drab affair 9-6 at the break.
A daft foul by Jim Hamilton as he aggressively booted the ball from Danny Care’s hands saw Wilkinson with the chance to level the game for a third time which he duly did. His captain Steve Borthwick thanked him in an odd way, however, the Saracens lock crashing into his own player and Wilkinson was forced to leave the field with an unsightly shiner.
Flood replaced Wilkinson and immediately kicked over after an offside, but again the game was levelled as Parks punished the failure of James Haskell to release.
Parks then saw his next penalty attempt rebound off the woodwork and things got no prettier when both England’s Ugo Monye and Kelly Brown of the home side collided into each other with a powerful smash and both had to be replaced, the former in a neck brace.
England’s first missed penalty followed as Flood hit wide and then came his agonising miss as the teams could not be separated.