Sean Lineen, one of the greats of Scotland rugby, has called on the players of today to lose the underdog tag and start showing the world their true potential, starting this weekend against Canada in Aberdeen.

On the evidence of last weekend’s infuriating defeat by South Africa, the grand slam-winning centre, who is now the backs consultant in the international coaching panel, believes that the side are ready to take the next step up the ladder.

It is important that they win. While they still have a chance of making the top eight in the world rankings, and so getting an easier seeding in the next Rugby World Cup, a draw or defeat by Canada would drop them right down the pecking order, possibly as low as eleventh, at the only time when these rankings really matter.

Gaining eighth place depends on Argentina defeating Ireland so is out of their hands, but Scotland could do their confidence the world of good if they can put in a more convincing performance than Wales managed against the same opponents last week.

According to Lineen, his charges are close to getting there and the only thing standing the way of a run of consistent success is conquering their red-zone fever. “You cannot replicate it in training, but players have to make good decisions in the last ten minutes of games, and it is frustrating that in the circumstances they didn’t,” he said.

Lineen, additionally head coach at Glasgow, also talked about his disappointment at the way that Dan Parks was treated by a section of the supporters, who booed when he went on as a blood replacement at fly half. “I was very unhappy to see something like that from the crowd,” the coach said. “He is a confident player, but it does not go down well when he runs on and is booed for trying his hardest for his country.

“He missed the kicks, which adds fuel to the fire, but the lad has played some outstanding games for Scotland and he is not trying to miss. He is a strong character, but I would like to think that when he comes on against Canada he will get the respect he deserves.”

Despite all that and despite losing a game that Scotland should have won, Lineen is convinced that the team are going in the right direction and he gave a strong hint that changes for the game on Saturday will be kept to a minimum after taking injuries into account.

After the disappointments of the past two weeks, it is important that Scotland get a taste of that winning feeling, and a taste of what it is like to score tries, and even though Canada are rapidly improving as their squad become accustomed to each other on this tour, Scotland should still be too strong for them.

“We still have to win this game, and it is really important that we do win it,” Lineen said. “The players are hurting after last week and so are the coaches. There is progress being made, but we have to win this one. Looking round the Scotland changing-room after the game, there was genuine disappointment, frustration and some anger. The players know they can’t keep saying there is progress, they have to win.”

The big frustration was that, after playing controlled rugby for most of the match, when the chance came for Scotland to pull the result back from being four points down, the cohesion and decision-making faltered.

Lineen highlighted four crucial errors in the last ten minutes — three of them from Phil Godman, the fly half, and the other when the ball was thrown to the backs when the pack were preparing and attempt to shove a scrum over the line — as the reasons for defeat.

It is that ability to keep cool heads when the result is there for the taking that Scotland need to find, and the only way they are going to do that is by experiencing the cauldron of international rugby and learning how to handle the pressure, which is why the Canada match matters.

“It is very important that we take all the good stuff from the last two games and put it into practice against Canada,” Lineen said.