David Gourlay has been Scotland's head coach for less than a year and much of his time so far has been spent on doing the background work necessary to ensure that the required support is in place for his development programmes.
He has, too, already arranged for two leading players, as yet unnamed but being selected on the basis of their capacity to gain maximum benefit from the trip, to play in grand prix competition for Australian teams later this year .
However, to identify and hone talent longer term, he needs others within Bowls Scotland, the governing body formed after the men's and women's games amalgamated two years ago, to show vision.
"What we are lacking in Scotland is a competition pathway; it's severely lacking," said Gourlay. "There are lots and lots of competitions that our players play in and sometimes they play in too many. What we need to try to do – and it's a huge task – is to create a group of competitions that are open to everybody that wants to compete in them, but they've got to be relevant competitions. They've got to be in relevant playing conditions.
"The Aussies did that about seven years ago by creating a series of grand prix tournaments and they've proved to be very successful. They're now redefining them, but they are different because they can play competitions every weekend with big-money prizes.
"There's a whole different set of pressures that come when you are playing in that situation and some of our guys are not used to it. What we need to do is give every bowler the opportunity at talent identification days. That's something I'm hoping we can introduce next year: having a series of talent ID days where people can come along and go through the same drills as the elite players. It's got to be competitive as well, though."
He notes that Scotland is hardly unique in having this problem. "In no way is Scotland the country furthest behind in this; all the UK countries are struggling with it," he said.
As will be familiar to knowledgeable observers of Scottish sport, there is a hard core of reactionaries who are resistant to change, who claim there is no need to modernise something that has worked for many years and seek to portray this as a battle to save traditional competitions.
The reality is that the need to move forward has been demonstrated by a serious drop-off in Scottish performance at recent major games, as other countries have become more professional. Only a single medal was secured at the 2008 World Championships and none at all at the subsequent Commonwealth Games.
"Some of our tournaments have a great historical background and there's nothing stopping us maintaining those which have served us well in the past, but it's about having something that can run alongside them," Gourlay continued. "That way we're not forgetting the past or forgetting how well we've done, but we're just trying to change it slightly.
"However, the board at Bowls Scotland are progressive and they can see things that we can change and add on to make things even better in the future."
In time-honoured fashion, the self-styled traditionalists also like to claim to be more in touch with the grass-roots game which, they say, is unsupportive of those in elite squads.
Far from that being the case, though, what the national coach is looking to do is respond to their claims that there are many other players across the country who could be as successful as the likes of multiple world and Commonwealth champions Paul Foster and Alex Marshall.
"It's all about giving grass-roots bowlers the opportunity to compete against the perceived best and having their chance to shine," said Gourlay.
He knows it will take courage to push for that, given the entrenched nature of those who prefer to find reasons not to do things rather than seeking to move forward.
He already has discovered what responsibility is all about: his first squad selection for a major tournament, the forthcoming World Championships in Australia later this year, inevitably meaning that his honeymoon period in the post was over.
His efforts since taking over last autumn as Scotland's head coach have been widely lauded by leading figures in the sport, though, and Gourlay is acutely aware of the importance of bringing about change in an intelligent, considerate manner, rather than attacking some of the cultural issues that have hindered progress.
"We have some outstanding bowlers who have achieved world championship and Commonwealth gold medals without any support or what they might see as interference," he said. "Possibly they've done that in spite of the system, but the crux of it is that they've done it themselves and have found their way through the minefield. What we're looking to do is clear that away for them and make it as easy as possible. We do need some adversity in sport, though, and people do need to have challenges; I think that's one of the things that's made Scotland good. We play with a passion and sometimes it's been a struggle for us. So it's just finding that fine balance between the two."
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