Given the amount of talent and firepower available to both teams in their backline, sparks could fly when Scotland take on Australia at Murrayfield tomorrow afternoon.
In the parlance of the boxing pages, styles make fights.
Certainly, it is not difficult to envisage a scenario where these two teams serve up a classic.
In the blue corner, Scotland have Sione Tuipulotu, Huw Jones, Darcy Graham and Duhan van der Merwe.
In the green-and-gold corner, the Wallabies have their new superstar Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii, Len Ikitau, Andrew Kellaway and wing wizard Harry Potter making his debut.
Whatever happens, it’s unlikely to be dull. Australia come into this match having scored 13 tries — five against England, eight against Wales — over the past fortnight. They are red-hot.
There is an expectation that this clash with Scotland could see both teams going all guns blazing, providing box-office entertainment, as Gregor Townsend’s side seek to finish the year on a high.
Especially with the midfield battle between Tuipulotu, Jones, Suaalii and Ikitau, Scotland head coach Townsend sees potential for sparks to fly.
Scotland boss Gregor Townsend is looking to round off the Autumn series with a win
Australia come to Murrayfield off the back of impressive wins over England and Wales
Australia’s Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii trains ahead of this weekend’s clash at Murrayfield
But Townsend also made it clear that his team won’t simply stand back and admire the talents of Suaalii, the rugby league convert who has taken Test rugby by storm since making his debut at Twickenham a fortnight ago.
Instead, the Scotland boss wants his team to target Suaalii as much as possible and apply pressure to a player who is still only 21 years old and hugely inexperienced at the top level.
‘When you look at those centre combinations, you see players who have the ability to do more than one thing,’ said Townsend. ‘Yeah, it could be quite tasty.
‘There’s been a lot of talk around Suaalii. He’ll take a lot of confidence from his performance at Twickenham. He looks world-class already. Ikitau, too — he’s a very good player.
‘Whether it’s carrying direct like Sione and Ikitau can do, they’ve also got offloads and creativity. And then the 13s (Jones and Suaalii) are running lines.
‘Obviously, Suaalii’s height and his offloading ability provides an extra point of difference in his game. I’m sure the centres will be looking for the ball as much as they can.
Huw Jones celebrates getting on the scoresheet against Fiji alongside Sione Tuipulotu
‘There isn’t much tape to look at with Suaalii, but we’ve obviously looked at him as much as we can. For us, can we put pressure on him?
‘Because he’s only had 80 minutes, plus 20 minutes defending (off the bench against Wales), at Test level in union. We saw his attacking threats more in the England game. We obviously need to respect that, realising that there might be times he makes breaks or gets an offload away.
‘We need to do the best we can to shut that down, but also making sure that in the next phase, you’re ready to go again if he has got in behind you.’
Townsend has picked a settled team for the final game of the Autumn Series, with former captain Jamie Ritchie coming into the back row in the absence of Jack Dempsey.
There were some suggestions that Townsend should drop Van der Merwe, a point made by former Scotland captain Andy Nicol in Mail Sport earlier this week.
Especially given the impact of Tom Jordan, who drops to the bench, there was a feeling that a shake-up in the back three may have been on the cards.
But Townsend insisted that never really entered his thinking, with Van der Merwe, Graham and Blair Kinghorn starting together for the first time since the World Cup last year.
‘They (the back three) played a lot of games together,’ said Townsend. ‘Darcy did miss a lot of rugby with injury, but he has bounced back so well over the last few weeks and at Murrayfield in particular.
The Scots followed up Fiji win with defeat against world champions South Africa
‘So to have the three of them together, they know each other well. They played at Edinburgh together. Blair was on terrific form coming into this season and coming into this campaign.
‘He had to play on the wing because we did pick up injuries before the South Africa game but it’s good to see him back at full-back and Darcy back in. They have earned the right to play.
‘With Jamie, he was involved in both our wins this year in the Six Nations. He’s had to deal with no longer being captain and also deal with the increased competition in the back row.
‘But I believe he was playing some of his best rugby at the end of the season with Edinburgh. He was showing his super-strengths — he was in the top two of winning jackal turnovers in the URC.
‘He’s also very good aerially and that came out for Edinburgh and it’s coming out more and more in Test rugby when they’ve changed these laws.
‘Over the last two or three weeks the aerial battle is now more chaotic and more important than it was leading into this tournament.
‘So we see Jamie in both those areas as well as his skill and his experience which can help those around him.’
Scotland have won three of their last four matches against the Wallabies, but this will be the first time they have encountered Joe Schmidt since he took charge.
Johnny Matthews impressed as his side ran riot against Portugal last weekend
Schmidt caused Scotland no end of pain during his time as Ireland head coach and Townsend sees some similarities with a possession-based approach that aims to starve teams of the ball.
Asked about that and the fact Scotland may need to defend without the ball for long spells, Townsend said: ‘Yes — and we have to do something about that.
‘We have to find ways of getting the ball back. The best way is getting it back directly and through the tackle, but also being so strong in defence that they kick it back to you.
‘You see clear signs of how Australia are playing that are very similar to Ireland (played under Schmidt). An easier way to keep hold of the ball is playing tight off scrum-half. They’ve got some willing ball-carriers that can do that.
‘There will be times where they will go wide and that gives us more of an opportunity. We have to be looking for opportunities in every phase.
‘Possession can lead to penalties, can lead to frustration at times if you’ve not got the ball. If you’re ill-disciplined in your defence, that becomes a line-up ball you have to defend.
‘Or three points and the opposition are kicking over. That strategy worked really well for Ireland. We’ve got to break the game up.
Townsend has hailed the impact of Joe Schmidt since taking over as Australia coach
‘I have real faith in our defence in doing that. It’s just a different challenge for the defence this week.
‘You could see how they were progressing even before those two wins against England and Wales. They had a very good win against Argentina away from home.
‘They had a lot of play against the All Blacks in particular and the coaching of Joe Schmidt was coming through.
‘A possession-based game, evolving that to bring the centres into the game as much as possible. And then in the last two weeks, they’ve been scoring a lot of points which shows their attacking threats.
‘It’s very similar to how he built a successful period with Leinster and Ireland in particular. There’s a lot of depth in Australian rugby. Now they’ve got confidence, you can see the quality coming through even more.’
