SCOTLAND need Josh Davey to continue to be as deadly with a cricket ball in his hand as he is with a rifle.

The Aberdeen-born quick bowler has enjoyed a productive time at this T20 World Cup, sitting third in the table of leading wicket takers with nine prior to England’s game with Sri Lanka yesterday.

His four for 18 against Papua New Guinea in the first round represents the high watermark to date but he has claimed at least one scalp in every other game barring the frustrating loss to Namibia when a batting collapse gave the bowlers little to work with.

The challenge of taking his wicket tally into double figures gets much tougher from here on in, with Scotland facing New Zealand tomorrow before taking on the might of India and Pakistan before the weekend is through.

How Davey performs will be pivotal to Scotland’s prospects and he remains undaunted by what lies ahead.

“I’ve just tried to keep things as simple as I can and play the percentages,” he explains of his success with the ball.

“Coming off the back of the county season I’ve developed some gameplans that have been fairly successful so I’m just trying to stick to those and take them to the next level. And if I execute, they generally work. It didn’t work obviously against Afghanistan but other than that I’ve bowled pretty well throughout the tournament so I’m pretty happy.

“We had belief coming into the Super 12s; there've been a couple of disappointing results but I don’t think that belief has gone.

“This is what World Cups are about – the chance to play the best teams in the world. You can challenge yourself to see where you are personally as a player and also we can earmark where we are as a team against these nations. It’s going to be tough but this is why you play in these tournaments.”

New Zealand, beaten finalists in the 2019 50-over World Cup, are often overlooked amid the rush to heap praise on Australia, England and India but not within the Scotland camp.

The manner of the Kiwis’ victory over India the other day has not gone unnoticed and Davey – who played with Devon Conway at Somerset this season – is wary of their threat

“It’s funny how people don’t highlight New Zealand more coming into major events,” he adds. “They’re pretty much always up there in the last four. They were finalists in the last World Cup and I wouldn’t be surprised if they go through and are right up there again.

“They have fantastic ability and adapt to conditions really well. They’ve got all bases covered – they’re a good fielding side, power-hitters and good front-line seamers, so they’re always competitive.”

Conway’s incredible tumbling catch against Pakistan was made into a Superman-style meme but Davey revealed that his former team-mate was happy to play it down.

“He played about six or seven T20s with us and maybe four one-day games. He’s a good man. I’ve seen him around the hotel and had a catch up. He’s so modest as a bloke. He said he just ran around and stuck his hand out and it went in!”

The structure of the tournament has meant a long wait for Scotland between their second and third Super 12 matches, with the squad eager to do as much as bubble restrictions allow.

“We asked Kenny [Crichton], the team manager, to see what we can do. Part of the resort is linked to a shooting range so they kindly opened it an hour early so we could have a few shots and that was good fun. Some of the guys shot handguns and others went clay pigeon shooting.

“I do that quite a lot at home so I thought I’d have a go in the desert – it was a bit different to the English countryside! Chris Sole was pretty good as well so there was a bit of competition.”

Davey has also made regular starring appearances in Kyle Coetzer’s social media feeds, required to wave a hand towards his captain as part of a long-standing ‘Wavey Davey’ gag.

“Costa [Coetzer] started doing that at the 2015 World Cup – I think it stemmed from someone in the crowd saying ‘Davey give us a wave’ and I said to the boys it was ridiculous.

“With his sense of humour, Kyle was going to get me waving at every point on our trip, in different places. People have loved it and were calling for it to come back at this World Cup, so we decided to do it again.

“It’s a bit of fun to pass the time. It’s got a lot of love so I guess we’ll keep doing it. Kyle films it and I’m the star of the show!

“He does sometimes catch me off-guard and I’ll see him in the distance. It’s quite funny and he’s getting creative with it now.”