World Cup defeat by Boks irrelevant to Murrayfield meeting - Townsend

Gregor Townsend says Scotland's defeat to South Africa in last year's Rugby World Cup will have no bearing on Sunday's Autumn Nations Series showdown between the sides at Murrayfield.

The Springboks eased to a 18-3 victory in the World Cup pool opener in Marseille before going on to retain the trophy.

"Different contexts," Townsend said when asked what lessons his team took from that defeat in the Stade Velodrome.

"I think the first game of the World Cup, there's probably more emotion that goes through the players' minds about how important that game was, not only as a one-off game, but our chances in the World Cup.

"The fact that we have played them, I think the players have felt what it's like to go up against the Springboks, from whatever area of the game is relevant to them. It could be how they defend, line-out, the contact area.

"So they know now what, or they've got recent experience of how it is to go up against the Springboks team.

"And also there's a lot of changes since then. Changes in maybe how we play, but certainly how they've played since the World Cup. They're very innovative around what they want to do off set-piece. And they move the ball wide.

"They'll play at pace, they'll play much more of an open game, which wasn't so much the case in the World Cup.”