Scotland head coach Andy Robinson praised his players following the dramatic 9-8 win over Australia at Murrayfield – the nation’s first victory over the Wallabies for 27 years – and highlighted the character shown by the team.

Leading 9-3 with only five minutes remaining, Australia clawed their way in the closing stages and scored a try through Ryan Cross in the final act of the 80 minutes of play.

But Matt Giteau missed the resultant conversion; triggering jubilant scenes from the 44, 762 crowd and the culmination of an entire match of sheer hard graft from the home team which prompted Robinson to congratulate his players.

Robinson said: “That was the most courageous performance I’ve ever been involved with – either as a player or as a coach.”

Man-of-the-match Phil Godman contributed nine points (three penalties) while replacement Chris Paterson nailed the all-important drop-goal to clinch a famous Hopetoun Cup triumph.

Spurred on by passionate home support, Scotland rolled up their sleeves and unceremoniously got stuck into their illustrious opponents.

Before the Bank of Scotland Corporate Autumn Test series, new head coach Andy Robinson revealed that he wanted his team to inspire the nation and the players accomplished that goal on Saturday evening with a gutsy and committed performance.

The Test match was always going to be determined by a small margin and dependant on which side showed the greater desire to edge over the finish-line.

Thankfully, it was the men in Blue that displayed the necessary amounts of character an discipline in order to get the job done.

Make no mistake, Scotland produced a masterclass of impenetrable defensive work – mixing expertly-executed hits with some shrewd work at the breakdown to ensure that Australia only managed to make one breakthrough; which was right at the end.

Losing captain Chris Cusiter as early as the 20th minute was a severe blow to Scotland, but Rory Lawson, who was originally scheduled to lead Scotland ‘A’ the previous night, proved to be an ample deputy and played a pivotal part in the victory.

As expected, the weather played its part in ensuring that neither side could comfortably employ an expansive brand of attacking rugby, so a series of searching kicks were launched into the Edinburgh night sky throughout the match.

But Scotland adapted well to the situation with Alex Grove, once again, impressing in midfield and Al Kellock proving to be an excellent captain in Cusiter’s absence.

Australia took the lead through a well-taken penalty from Giteau on the six-minute mark after a forward had been penalized for pulling down at a line-out.

But 22 minutes, stand-off Godman kept his nerve to restore parity with a long-range penalty; much to the delight of the vocal home support.

Australia then began to seize control of proceedings and pegged Scotland back into their home side’s own 22.

However the Wallabies could not translate their possession into points because the once trusty boot of Giteau suddenly started to misfire.

In the space of a few minutes, the Australia playmaker had missed a relatively straightforward penalty from 12 yards away and then followed that up with a miscued drop-goal from a similar distance.

Nevertheless Scotland took full advantage of Australia’s lack of ruthless precision and, following a further Giteau penalty miss early in the second half, ignited a famous comeback.

Replacement Nick De Luca’s kick though suddenly put Australia on the back-foot and the Wallabies, who had beaten England and drawn with Ireland earlier in their tour, looked decidedly fragile.

Godman suffered an uncharacteristic penalty miss before making amends five minutes later with a valuable three-point haul – thanks to the help of the post.

His effort seemed to be sailing marginally wide of the target, but cannoned of the frame and the touch judges raised their flags.

That event proved to be the catalyst and Australia then had two tries disallowed – one for a blatantly visible forward pass and the other was determined via the TMO.

Paterson’s well-struck drop-goal seemed to have put the finishing touches on a resolute display, but Australia had other ideas and constructed one final attack upfield.

Over 15 phases of play took place, before Australia eventually found a gap in Scotland’s phenomenal defensive line, but Giteau’s miss meant that Robinson’s troops ended up on top and now face Argentina next Saturday (28 November) in an upbeat mood.

Scotland: R Lamont (Toulon); S Lamont (Scarlets), A Grove (Worcester Warriors), G Morrison (Glasgow Warriors), S Danielli (Ulster); P Godman (Edinburgh), C Cusiter (captain, Glasgow Warriors); A Jacobsen (Edinburgh), R Ford (Edinburgh), M Low (Glasgow Warriors), N Hines (Leinster), A Kellock (Glasgow Warriors), A Strokosch (Gloucester), J Barclay (Glasgow Warriors), J Beattie (Glasgow Warriors).

Replacements: D Hall (Glasgow Warriors), K Traynor (Edinburgh), J White (Clermont Auvergne), R Vernon (Glasgow Warriors), R Lawson (Gloucester), C Paterson (Edinburgh), N De Luca (Edinburgh).

Australia: A Ashley-Cooper; P Hynes, D Ioane, Q Cooper, D Mitchell; M Giteau, W Genia; W Palu, G Smith, R Elsom (capt); M Chisholm, J Horwill; B Alexander, S Moore, Be Robinson.
Replacements: T Polota-Nau, S Kepu, D Mumm, R Brown, L Burgess, R Cross, J O'Connor.

Referee: Romain Poite (France)