Robinson, Scotland's assistant coach, selected a virtually full-strength side for the trip to Wales with only Scotland captain Mike Blair missing from the line-up.

The backline in particular had a lot to play for with Simon Webster, Chris Paterson, Nick de Luca and Ben Cairns all needing to impress Scotland coach Frank Hadden.

Unfortunately for Paterson, Robinson also started him on the bench as Hadden has done in all three RBS 6 Nations games so far this campaign with Hugo Southwell preferred at No. 15 as he has been at Test level.

Cairns and De Luca, who have both had a taste of RBS 6 Nations rugby in the past year, also did little to convince Hadden he should split up the Glasgow combination of Graeme Morrison and Max Evans.

One positive to come out of the 13-6 defeat, which was secured by the Scarlets thanks to eight points from Daniel Evans, was the performance of Scott MacLeod.

He started ahead of another Scotland cap, Craig Hamilton, and played well to increase Scotland's lock options - with only Ally Kellock fit and in form of Hadden's recognised second-row men.

Ally Hogg, who failed to make the Scotland match-day 22 for the last two RBS 6 Nations games having started the first, played moderately well and looks set to miss out again against Ireland.