Scotland cricket's authorities told to be 'bold and brave' as World Cup clashes get harder

Kyle Coetzer of Scotland is bowled by Mujeeb Ur Rahman of Afghanistan.

The Scots head into today’s Super 12s match with fourth-in-the-world New Zealand in Dubai (10am UK time) with nothing to lose.

They then face third-in-the-world India on Friday and second-in-the-world Pakistan on Sunday and if Shane Burger’s men were to win any of the three it would be the equivalent of Scotland beating Brazil at football or seeing off the All Blacks at rugby.

Usually, Scotland do not get to test themselves against such high-profile teams regularly – and 37-year-old Coetzer wants this run to the second phase of a global event to spark a brighter future for Cricket Scotland.

“As an organisation we need to be bold and brave, we need to try and find ways to keep progressing,” he said.

“We have to not be satisfied with being OK. We have to push the boundaries a little bit further.

“How that looks, I don’t know exactly, but it’s important we group together to find the path to the next level.

“We’re going to have to have some help to get there and we’re going to need some bold and brave plans - and bold and brave people - to be involved to get there.”

The Scots headed into this phase of the tournament on a high after victories in the First Round over Bangladesh, Papua New Guinea and Oman.

They were then brought back down to earth with a bump with defeats to Afghanistan and Namibia last week.

The latter loss last Wednesday was particularly hard for the squad to take given that they are currently ranked above their African opponents in this format of the game.

However, a couple of days rest and recovery – which also allowed the finger injury which kept Coetzer out of that game to improve – has been followed by a good block of training and the Scots are raring to go once again.

With only two sides progressing to the last four from each of the two Super 12 groups, Scotland’s hopes of making it through are slim to none, but as things stand they are on the same number of points – zero – as Virat Kohli and his much talked about India side in Group Two.

“Every players puts some sort of expectation on themselves, we have to keep believing we can play against these teams,” 37-year-old batter Coetzer adds ahead of facing the Kiwis.

“There’s always going to be pressure. Playing the First Round games in Oman there was plenty of pressure because of what was on the line for Scottish and associate cricket, it was huge, but we dealt with it.

“You have to keep earning the right to get to where we are. You can’t just turn up. Expectation is always there, but you have to embrace facing these big sides and take it on and I want the guys to show what they can do and enjoy the next few days.”