Should Max Evans fail to recover from injury in time for Sunday's meeting with France, it will limit options, but Scotland's management have had some major decisions to make either way.

The Castres back may have established himself as a regular on the wing for the national team but shifting him back to centre where he initially made his mark and gained Scotland honours, could open up other options as a cutting edge is sought.

Where Evans plays can have a major influence on getting the balance between power and incisiveness that the coaches are looking for.

With Nick De Luca having so far failed to reproduce the form he has shown for Edinburgh, admittedly partly because of a lack of supply, they must have considered pairing Evans with former Glasgow Warriors midfield partner Graeme Morrison.

Whether alongside Evans or De Luca, the burly inside centre responded superbly to being dropped from the national squad without having had the chance to so much as come off the bench against England, when asked to take over the Glasgow captaincy and at last looks to be back to something approaching top form at club level.

That would allow Sean Lamont to return to his best role on the wing and, for all that Lee Jones has played well in his first two Test matches, a strong case could be made for putting his brother Rory on the other flank.

That would ensure that there were three very powerful figures in the back line while leaving room to introduce the teenager whose debut showing was the biggest consolation for Scotland supporters in Cardiff.

While he has yet to fill out there is something in the way that Stuart Hogg's footwork and deceptive turn of pace takes him past players that is reminiscent of the young Brian O'Driscoll and surely no greater compliment could be paid to a modern European back.

His has been an astonishing rise this season when it is considered that he was on an apprentice contract and not even in Glasgow's official 36-man RaboDirect Pro12 squad when Sean Lineen decided to throw him into the fray at the beginning of the season.

Some will urge caution in how he is handled, but just as was the case with the then 20-year-old O'Driscoll he has instantly shown himself to be good enough to step up at a time when Scottish rugby, just as Irish rugby was in the late 90s, is desperately seeking inspiration.

It is worth remembering that when O'Driscoll, who has become the talisman for this great era of Irish success, made his debut in June 1999, Ireland had not beaten Scotland for 13 years.

Lineen has made it clear he envisages Hogg occupying the same outside centre role as O'Driscoll in the long term but he has so far used him much more at full-back and Andy Robinson, Scotland's head coach, is on record as saying that is where he is being considered at Test level at the moment.

No matter where Hogg plays or who is in the three-quarter line, however, the decision-making has to be right to get the best out of them and that raises the question of what has to be done at half-back.

Having put Greig Laidlaw and Chris Cusiter in my own preferred team to start this championship I was surprised when they were then selected together for the meeting with Wales because as I repeatedly said both in print and in conversation thereafter, I thought I had made a schoolboy error in suggesting that pairing.

My thinking had been based on the view that Cusiter is the finest individual player in the country and that Laidlaw was the in-form standoff and goal-kicker. However, no sooner had that been printed than I was reminded of the unique way – in Scottish terms at least – that Laidlaw and Mike Blair interchange at half-back for Edinburgh.

With Laidlaw, for all his strength of demeanour and character, still a novice in the position it seemed sensible to introduce him to Test rugby with his regular partner who is himself a top-class scrum-half with vast experience. In those terms, it seemed significant when Laidlaw scored Scotland's long awaited try, ending a 386-minute wait in Tests, from the scrum-half position which he might not have been occupying had Blair not replaced Cusiter by that stage of the match.

Like Cusiter, both Blair and Laidlaw are men with leadership experience, which takes us to the pack where the temptation might be to make only the change that has been enforced by Al Strokosch fracturing his hand – such has been the supply of ball – but where further change might just bring added benefits.

In a team that is repeatedly losing its composure at critical moments what is needed is sound leadership and cool headedness in every department and in Al Kellock, Scotland's World Cup captain and John Barclay, his Glasgow Warriors clubmate, they have such figures available.

Clearly Ross Rennie and Dave Denton are now automatic choices in the back-row and perhaps the easiest thing to do would be to introduce as a direct replacement for Strokosch, yet another Warrior in Rob Harley who may be young but has also shown his capacity to lead when captaining Glasgow in the early part of the season.

However, this may be the right time to bring Barclay back, whether as a second openside operating alongside Rennie, or at No.8 where he has performed better for Glasgow this season than at openside, which in turn would allow Denton to revert to his club role on the blindside.

Kellock's return alongside Richie Gray would also mean that it was a pack built on club partnerships as the Glasgow locks tucked in behind the Edinburgh front-row, albeit Jon Welsh's try-scoring form for Glasgow, crossing the line in each of the last two matches, may just have caught the selectors' eye.