Scotland ready to return to winning ways

The back row, in particular, is tougher and more balanced compared to the trio who started in Dublin, two of whom were specialist opensides. John Hardie, this week’s sole No 7, has staked his future career on this one game, and can be expected to deliver. So too can Stuart McInally, who is making his debut at hooker a couple of years on from his switch from back row to front. Behind the scrum, Sam Hidalgo-Clyne is making his first start after six caps as a replacement, and the three-quarter line looks particularly powerful.

The Italians, by contrast, have gone with a largely untried outfit for their first outing of the build-up. Their bench, which contains three men with over 100 caps each, is a lot more formidable than the starting line-up.

Having said that, there is an obvious worry that Italy will again do what they did at Murrayfield: ride the punches, keep their shape - and then strike late on. Individual errors were in part to blame for the home team’s 19-22 defeat back in February, but the biggest, most damaging flaw was the inability to stop the Italian maul.

Jonathan Humphreys, the forwards coach, explained yesterday that, rather than training specifically to iron out the faults that were so costly in that match, the pack had concentrated on an all-round improvement. “It always remains a concern in the modern game,” he said. “Mauls are a potent attacking weapon for Italy - look at Treviso, they’ve been particularly good at it for many years.

“You never say the problem is resolved, because it’s always there. You know that if you step off the mark, don't address it in the right manner, you will come unstuck as we did that day.”

Humphreys, who has been scrummaging coach as well since the departure of Massimo Cuttitta earlier this year, has been particularly impressed by McInally’s progress in recent months, even though he admitted that more work was required on the set piece. “He’s a very diligent kid, a very thoughtful kid. He’s finding his way in that scrummaging area: the rest of his game is exceptional.

“He’s starting to play like a back row, which is what we always wanted. We didn't want him to move to hooker and become a hooker: we wanted him to be a back rower playing hooker.

“The work-ons for him will always be the technical aspects of being a hooker, and he has made phenomenal progress over a very short time. Those aspects of the hookers' basics will always be a work on as they are for Fordy” - Ross Ford, who also started out in the back row - “and anyone else who plays that way.”

With just a couple of games to go before the final World Cup squad of 31 is selected, internal competition within the squad is higher than ever, and players are understandably fixated on their own games. It is therefore indicative of the high esteem in which McInally is held that several of his team-mates have gone out of their way to express their pleasure at his imminent debut in his adopted position.

“He was the outstanding player at our age group - head and shoulders above the rest of us in terms of his playing ability,” Matt Scott said. “He’s probably the only person in the squad who’s resilient enough to cope with that change. He’s worked so hard to do it.”

Cotter and his coaches have stuck to their task of preparing their players to peak at the World Cup, deciding against picking a team designed to go out and win at all costs here. Even so, they are well aware that nothing would say they are on the right track as much as a victory this evening.

“That's not lost on us,” Humphreys said. “We want to go out and win. We’re disappointed that we didn't get that against Ireland. I think this team needs it to go with the hard work and everything else. We need that.”

They need it, and they should get it tonight. The sun will set around half-time, but by the end of the match the outlook for the team ought to have brightened considerably.