Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer has come a long way from the crisis management of his first six months in charge. (Gallo)
The build-up to South Africa's Test against Scotland this week has been a good deal less fraught than its counterpart in 2010, when Bjorn Basson and Chiliboy Ralepelle were sent home on the Monday after a narrow win against Wales. Both had failed a drugs test taken after the first match of the tour against Ireland in Dublin, the results of which only came to light a week later.
Basson and Ralepelle were subsequently absolved of blame and the can was carried by the Springbok medical team, who were apparently unaware of the presence of methylhexanemine in a supplement the tourists were using. It seems crazy now, but there was a moment when the whole tour seemed in jeopardy, as the entire squad had ingested the banned stimulant.
In the event, some furious behind-the-scenes politicking got the wagon rolling again but the quest for the first Springbok Grand Slam since 1960-1961 ended on a wet and muddy day at Murrayfield.
It was perhaps understandable that the minds of the tourists were not as focused on their Scottish opponents as they needed to be. But the performance was far below that expected of a team that had carried all before them in 2009 and had won the World Cup in 2007.
Three years later, there is no Grand Slam at stake and non-rugby matters have been dominated by a squad trip to Old Trafford to watch Manchester United play. Coach Heyneke Meyer is so relaxed that he has made several changes to the team that won against Wales, most of which are not fitness-related. The Scotland game has been targeted as a way of testing some new combinations in relatively benign conditions.
As fraught with danger as underestimating Scotland might be, it shows that Meyer has come a long way from the crisis management of his first six months in charge. He clearly believes that he has a far more adaptable squad than the one he inherited from Peter de Villiers, and now is the time to prove it.
The vast majority of Scotland's team played against the Springboks in Nelspruit in June. The tourists raced to a 17-3 lead before running out of steam in the second half. Even so, the result was in doubt until the last 10 minutes, which should suggest that there is no room for complacency this weekend.
The bald fact of the matter is that Scotland are not very good, but they have an uncanny ability to bring opponents down to their level. When assisted by a typical winter's day in Edinburgh, they can turn form on its head, as proved to be the case in 2010 and 2002. And there is no point bemoaning the conditions and the spoiling play adopted by the Scots, for those factors are at the very heart of the game of rugby union.
Until recently, it might have been argued that the true heart of the game, the one thing that sets it apart from all other ball sports, is the scrum. But successive attempts to make the set piece safer have resulted in emasculation. What began as a method of restarting the game has become a way of stopping it, and it doesn't seem to matter how the lawmakers decree that the engagement should occur.
It is a crying shame that a match as filled with high-quality rugby as last Saturday's encounter was should be remembered for the refereeing of Alain Rolland at the scrums. There have been few sadder sights of late than the forlorn figure of Coenie Oosthuizen leaving the field two minutes after he had come off the bench, the victim of a ludicrous yellow card. Rolland had reached the stage where he was simply guessing what was causing the scrum to drop and if anyone should have received their marching orders it was he.
The condition of the pitch did not seem to enter into Rolland's estimation. It is 14 years now since the ground was opened and it seems the Welsh Rugby Union are no closer to solving the problems associated with hothouse pitches. Saturday's rolled mud was almost as bad as the pitch used for the World Cup final in 1999.
Sadly, we may have more of the same this weekend, with the Murrayfield ground staff under siege from an infestation of nematode worms. They have taken a liking to the grass roots of the national stadium and the staff have resorted to dousing the field with garlic in an attempt to get rid of the worms.
Jokes about vampires and level playing fields aside, this is a game that the Boks should win comfortably. Of course, much the same assessment was made in 2010, when the Boks lost 21-17 exactly a week after the All Blacks had put the same opponents to the sword 49-3.
This year's All Blacks were tested to the full by France in Paris last week and Meyer's fervent hope will be that he does not lose too many key players to injury in Scotland ahead of next week's tour finale against Les Bleus.