AT THE turn of the millennium Colin Smith was Scotland's batting general, a towering presence at the forefront of any campaign. As time went by the giant wicket-keeper drifted down the order, still a first pick but a marker of depth with the bat rather than a pillar to lean on. Now comes the renaissance.

The first change Saltires fans will notice when cross-border combat returns to Edinburgh tomorrow is the absence of Paul Hoffmann and Craig Wright from the local bowling attack. The second difference will be the restoration of Smith, who has five half-centuries against the counties, to the office of senior batsman, the first obvious sign of Adi Birrell applying his consultant's remit, which is to get these players performing to their potential.

Birrell, the coach responsible for Ireland's earth-shattering World Cup breakthrough last year in the Caribbean, is an old admirer of Smith's. "With Ireland, we were always relieved when we played against Scotland and found that Colin Smith was batting at No 7," he confided over a coffee before heading to Namibia with head coach Pete Steindl and the squad last month.

By such circuitry the Aberdonian policeman, who will turn 36 in September, will find himself batting at four or five tomorrow against a Lancashire attack whose reputation precedes them: Andrew Flintoff, Sajid Mahmood and James Anderson might all be unleashed to share the ball with Glenn Chapple, who, unlike the unpredictable England trio, has wrecked Caledonian ambitions in the past.

Six-foot, five-inch Smith, despite the nickname of Floppy that has dogged him all these years, has a Viking's view of fear when it comes to aggressive bowling: hence the show of defiance he produced 13 months ago in St Kitts, a 50 against Australia when no other Scot caused the scorers to sharpen a pencil. This latest volte face from above will be seen by some as a backward step but new faces will be found in prominent roles elsewhere. Smith is qualified to create a little Indian summer for his career and, in the process, solidify a team in transition.

"I think this has a lot to do with Adi coming on board," said Smith, who scored 42 last week at Lord's against the MCC, surviving a torrid introduction with an experimental pink ball to put on over 100 for the third wicket with captain Ryan Watson. "I had always batted at five in the past until the era of Peter Drinnen, and I think the plan is for me to go in at five or four.

"I am excited by the opportunity after 18 months of batting at seven, where I don't think I performed that well. I realised that was where Peter saw me and so I prepared for it: I came up with new shots for spinners and so on. But if I had a choice, I would prefer to go up against pace bowlers. I wasn't actively looking to bat higher up. To be honest, I couldn't have given a shit if I was batting 11 if we were winning games. But the offer came along and I would be stupid not to accept it and revel in it."

The Scots, in fact, haven't won too many games since that accursed World Cup. Last year's Friends Provident Trophy campaign followed a desperately predictable pattern at home but was certainly worth watching on the road – two last-ball defeats in consecutive days followed by a terrific win on a soggy day in Manchester that solidified the Saltires' unbeaten record at Old Trafford. Lancashire coach Mike Watkinson will pause upon that stat for effect when addressing his team at Citylets Grange tomorrow morning.

"All or nothing" is the code by which Smith goes about his sport and he almost quit cricket in the autumn. After a long winter on the beat, the game dragged him back in. More precisely, it was a renewed optimism that Scottish cricket is in better shape than results suggest. If not quite dour, he is certainly no fantasist, and last summer he confided that our qualification prospects for the 2011 World Cup didn't exactly look rosy. A volte face of his own has washed away that pessimism.

"I think there's a group of about 18 players that in the next six months are going to be pushing very hard for selection – whereas before, I didn't think there was a lot of competition for places in many areas," he said, casting an undeliberate eye onto Wright's work as Cricket Scotland's youth performance manager, which will occupy him tomorrow as Scotland under-19 coach.

Gordon Drummond is charged with the tough task of filling Wright's shoes, both today and in the long term, and the Saltires might deploy four seamers tomorrow after calling up Gordon Goudie. Smith rates the ex-Middlesex youth highly and expects him to make a long-awaited impact after abandoning a "disastrous" change of action. So what of these eight arduous assignments against Durham, the Trophy champions, Lancashire, Yorkshire and Derbyshire?

"Our previous record at this level is we win a couple of games, have a couple of close games and get hammered in the rest, isn't it?" he chuckled. "These are top players we are up against, and if they make a day out of it, then fair enough. But I would like to think we can become more consistent – don't get shot out for 100 and don't find ourselves chasing 300.

"I had serious doubts last year about whether to continue but, for the first time in a while, I am really quite excited about this season because the atmosphere, with the new coaching set-up, is completely different."