Ireland's big upset in Nelson on Monday sent a warning to all 'top eight' sides that not being on your game against the smaller nations is a recipe for disaster.
Coached by ex Northern Knights and NZA coach Grant Bradburn and with ex-England international Paul Collingwood alongside on the coaches' bench, Scotland will offer a strong test. Not that the BLACKCAPS are taking them lightly.
"Scotland smashed Ireland and they have put a lot of other sides under pressure. We will respect Scotland as much as we do any other opposition," said head coach Mike Hesson.
The Scots feature several county players like Kyle Coetzer and Matt Machan, and are lead by Preston Mommsen, a transplanted South African. They played a series of matches against a very strong NZ A side at home last year, won 2-0 by NZ A but offered valuable experience to the visitors, who had a very warm welcome in the Octagon to the Edinburgh of the south this week. They'll be well supported in the crowd.
The temptation for the BLACKCAPS will be to give the players that missed out in Christchurch, like bowers Kyle Mills and Mitchell McClenaghan, batsman Tim Latham and local Nathan McCullum a run, but that call hasn't been made yet.
"We will assess how everyone has recovered from yesterday. It was a pretty heavy ground and there were a lot of sore bodies again. Three games in a week is going to be tough. We will look at who we have got fully fit, we will look at the conditions and we will look to pick our best XI. I think there will be a number of upsets in this tournament and if sides take anyone lightly they could get turned over. We will certainly scout and prepare the best we can for Scotland," said Hesson.
Dan Vettori bowls in the NZ XI match v Scotland in 2014.
Skipper Brendon McCullum echoed the sentiment" "Yeah, we did some scouting this morning on the bowlers. I've had plenty of footage the last little while that we can get our hands on and I've obviously tried to cover that, as well. That's one of our big things as a team, that we make sure we go in well planned and well prepared, but they gave us a good run for our money at Lincoln a few months ago.
"We've got to make sure we're on our game and treat it as if we're playing one of the bigger teams, as well, because in this World Cup I think we've seen at the moment with West Indies under a little bit of pressure, as well, that the associate teams certainly have players capable of standing up and making things pretty uncomfortable for you.
"It may not be perceived as one of the big teams, but to stress again, the points are still the same whether you beat a Sri Lankan team or whether you beat a Scottish team. You still get the same amount of points in this World Cup, and we've said all the way along that we're very respectful of any opposition that we come up against, and we're not good enough to take any team for granted. We know what works for us and we know how we can go about trying to get that performance, and that's very much where, like I said, our thoughts are at the moment is making sure that we turn up tomorrow, bringing our best game to the ground.
"There's no guarantees in this game, either, and as we've seen with West Indies today and even Zimbabwe last night with their performance against South Africa, in this sort of format, a couple of guys can take the game away from you pretty quickly, so we've got to maintain a real, I guess, emotional stability and a calm presence out there and make sure we do seize those chances when they do arise," said McCullum.
The match starts at 11am at Dunedin's University Oval on Tuesday.
NZ v Scotland - a short history
1999 Cricket World Cup - New Zealand needed a boost in run rate to be assured of progressing in the tournament and bowled Scotland out for 121, with Chris Harris taking 4-7. In reply, the BLACKCAPS chased down the total in 17.5 overs, with Roger Twose top scoring with 54, to get the win by six wickets and progress.
Warm up international, October 2014 - A NZ XI met Scotland in a a warm up fixture at Lincoln in 2014, and nearly resulted in a boil over. The NZ XI made 263 in chilly conditions with Corey Anderson making 53. Scotland made steady progress towards, needing two runs from the final ball to win, with Brendon McCullum effecting a run out to give NZ XI the win by one run.
Geoff Allott takes a wicket in the BLACKCAPS and Scotland's previous World Cup encounter in 1999.
