New Scotland rugby coach Matt Williams (pictured) has appointed the non-smoking, non-drinking utility back Chris Paterson to captain the team in the upcoming Six Nations tournament.
Paterson, who will be 26 next month, was one of Scotland's few successes in the World Cup where they were fortunate to make the quarter-finals but comes as some surprise as experienced hooker Gordon Bulloch had been paraded in front of the media at the Six Nations launch on Wednesday.
Williams, who replaced Ian McGeechan after the World Cup, said that Paterson was a role model for every Scot.
"Chris is an outstanding player, assured of his position," said former Leinster Lions coachWilliams, "His character as a man and his conduct as a non-smoker and non-drinker - but still with a great sense of humour - is a great example for the team and for the nation as someone we can look up to."
Williams was at pains to point out that Paterson and Bulloch - who will be vice-captain - would be like a partnership.
"Chris and Gordon will captain the side in the next 12 months. We see it as a partnership. They have a series of lieutenants on the field around them who will be part of the leadership group."
Paterson made the first of his 40 appearances against Spain in the 1999 World Cup and has scored 210 points, while he has starred at both winger and then fly-half when switched there during the World Cup by McGeechan after both Gregor Townsend and Gordon Ross failed to impress.
Bulloch is Scotland's most capped hooker since making his debut in 1997 with 58 caps - scoring four tries - and the 28-year-old was also a British and Irish Lion tourist to Australia in 2001.
Meanwhile Matt Williams is banking on some lateral thinking helping his side in this season's RBS Six Nations.
The Australian, brought in to succeed Ian McGeechan following Scotland's struggle to reach the World Cup quarter-finals last year, accepts that financially the team will always find it tough to match the likes of world champions England, but he insists that Scotland can nevertheless compete with rugby's major powers.
"I don't believe that the team and the coaches in the past were given the resources to compete against the great teams... It was like a middleweight boxer in a heavyweight division," Williams told reporters on Wednesday.
"We want the opportunity to stand toe-to-toe with the greats," added Williams, of a Scotland team that finished fourth in last season's Six Nations.
"It is really exciting that England are now the world champions. What players want is to test themselves against the best in the world. The great days are when you take on great teams and beat them... that's what you remember for the rest of your life."
And Williams insisted money alone was not the answer. "It's not just funding. We are working on a close relationship with the Scottish Institute of Sport in Stirling, where we have been training."
Williams, 43, added: "We are never going to match the giants for money; we are not asking for that. There's a lot of other ways to skin the cat.
"We have three professional teams who we have some influence over and we are adding resources to them in terms of coaching and technical advice which benefits them as well as us.
"What we are doing is exactly what Ireland have done, it's what Australia did. It's not rocket science," explained Williams.
Former Emerging Wallabies coach Williams hit the headlines when soon after his appointment he called for players seeking Scotland selection to be based there.
"There are obvious financial difficulties in Scotland. But at this World Cup we had 50 percent of players not based in Scotland - we can't compete at the next World Cup if that is still the case," he explained.
Since the Australia showpiece, Scotland have lost five players to international retirement including record cap holder and stand-off Gregor Townsend, scrum-half and former captain Bryan Redpath and wing Kenny Logan.
But Williams, who insisted he had not encountered any "negativity" since becoming the first foreigner to coach Scotland, put his trust in the squad's rising stars.
"We've got some really exciting young players - Nikki Walker (wing), Graeme Morrison (centre) and Chris Cusiter (scrum-half). "The trick is that you don't want to throw a young man in and burn him so he loses his confidence but he has to be blooded."
And Williams pleaded for patience, saying his team should not be judged on results alone.
"We need to make sure we put a process in place so that these young guys can succeed. Success for them might not necessarily be always scoring more points than the opposition.
"Now we always want to win but we want these young guys to focus on processes. We've got a very experienced forward pack that can cope with any international team. We've got to build our game around those guys and bring these young guys through."
Meanwhile Williams proved that his diplomatic skills were up to the job when he neatly side-stepped the issue of whether Scotland's theme song, Flower of Scotland, would be replaced by Highland Cathedral because of the former's 'anti-English' lyrics.
"It's not our decision. Waltzing Matilda (the unofficial Australian anthem) is about an itinerant thief who commits suicide. If we start worrying about the content of our songs we could be in serious trouble." AFP