Michael Leask believes qualifying for the World Cup would restore pride in Scottish cricket.
Scotland are on the brink of securing their place at October’s tournament in India.
The Saltires face Netherlands today in Bulawayo with a win or a narrow defeat being enough to earn qualification.
Although performances on the pitch have been good, the last few years have been hugely problematic Cricket Scotland.
As well as difficulties caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, the sport’s governing body was found to be institutionally racist and has had to deal with major ramifications following a review of its operations.
However, Aberdonian all-rounder Leask believes the national team’s displays as they chase a World Cup place have helped improve the outlook for cricket in Scotland.
The 32-year-old, who started his career with Stoneywood-Dyce, said: “We have been through a bit of a tough time.
“But the way this group has handled and conducted itself, we wear this shirt with a lot of pride.
“For us it’s about leaving this shirt in a better place than we found it – yes there have been some tough times – but we’re here competing and we’re doing a very good job of it at the moment.
“The biggest thing I believe in leaving this shirt better than you found it and this group is going a long way to doing that.
“Back home the support has been phenomenal, I can’t thank the people who have messaged us enough.
“We beat West Indies and everyone was talking about the West Indies not qualifying for the World Cup, we’ve put three test nations out of the World Cup, what more can we say?
“We’ve had unbelievable support from back home and we’ve got one more game to go and make them proud.”
Arduous task
The World Cup qualifying process is stacked against nations like Scotland, who are associate members of the ICC.
Just to reach the final qualifier the Saltires had to come through the 36-game slog that was the World Cricket League Two, a tournament which began in August 2019 at Mannofield.
Then in this qualifier Scotland have taken the scalps of test playing nations Ireland, West Indies and Zimbabwe.
Leask added: “Associate cricket is one of the hardest forms of cricket I firmly believe.
“Every single game is an absolute scrap, you don’t know when your next big fixture is going to be.
“But every game we get to step on the park as a nation is an absolute privilege and this is no different.
“We’ve got a huge opportunity against a European rival – who would have thought it would have been us against Netherlands to go to the World Cup?
“Two teams you probably would have thought might finish fifth and sixth are fighting it out for a World Cup place.
“Three test nations have not made it because they’ve been beaten by smaller teams.
“That to me is a sign of how much the teams that have to fight harder want it, there’s not as much funding, there’s not as much of anything and goodness me we have to fight hard to make it happen.”
‘Fought unbelievably hard’
As he reflects on Scotland’s approach in this tournament Leask believes the spirit within the squad has been crucial.
He said: “We’re a side that’s underdogs, every game we play we’re branded as underdogs.
“We’ve come into this tournament believing in our own ability, we’ve played every game like it’s a final and this is no different.
“That’s the way this group is, we’ve fought unbelievably hard in every fixture and we’ve come out on the right side in most of them.
“This team has been brilliant at not getting too high or too low, we’ve always pulled together and said ‘we’ve still got a chance in this game, no matter what’s happened we’ll take it deep.’
“We proved that again and we’ve got one more fixture in which to do that.”