By Chris Cusiter Scotland scrum-half

There's been a lot of competition on the table tennis at the training camp this week.

As it stands, Mike Blair's probably the top seed, with Dan Parks a very close second. As for me, I'd definitely put myself in the top five... but it's very competitive.

Scottish training has recaptured its fun element under Hadden

Come to think of it, if the November Tests were about table tennis, then the squad would do very well. We have some real depth!

It's a massive disappointment not to start Saturday's match against Argentina. It's the first time I will have sat on the bench for Scotland but I've had a good run for my country playing 16 in a row before now.

That said, it's still a massive honour to be in the squad and hopefully there will be scope for change in the future.

I've been very happy with my form over the summer with the Lions and this season, now there's not much else I can do except keep on playing like I'm playing.

Our new coach Frank Hadden has been very good in explaining his decision. It's been made clear to me that Mike has a far better idea of how Frank wants Scotland to play, having worked so closely together at Edinburgh.

I don't yet know Frank's style inside out but I'm willing to learn and prove I should be the man wearing the number nine shirt.

Frank's arrival has turned everything around in the Scottish camp - there's so much more enthusiasm and optimism.

I owe his predecessor Matt Williams a fair bit as he gave me a lot of chances but times have changed and everyone inolved would love to turn things around and make this Scotland team a successful one.

We can all expect to come to the end of November with sore bodies but hopefully smiles on our faces as well

We haven't performed as well all would have liked in the past couple of season and the arrival of Frank has brought a freshness and enthusiasm to the camp.

Let's hope we can transfer that to the pitch, which I think we can, and translate that to where it matters - results.

Training to date has been very enjoyable. There hasn't been too much of doing drills for the sake of drills, with the focus more on the gameplan and patterns of play.

As a result the training speeds by and is enjoyable rather than feeling like it's that thing you have to do between games, which is can be a real downer to a top performance come game day.

In fairness, the spirit's always been good in the squad even when we've not been performing - whether that be on the table tennis table or at poker - and we know each other pretty well after some three seasons together.

Hopefully the relatively good form of the Scottish pro teams will rub off on us as well. The Edinburgh guys are brimming with confidence, while us lot down at the Borders aren't doing too badly for ourselves either.

As for the three games, us Scots can all expect to come to the end of November with sore bodies, but hopefully smiles on our faces as well.

You could rarely muster three more physical sides than Argentina, Samoa and New Zealand and we know it'll be a massive challenge.

We've not actually beaten Argentina for 15 years, are behind them in the world rankings and they've taken some mighty scalps recently, so we go into Saturday's game as the underdogs.

It's a huge ask but we're finally turning the corner and feel we can pull it off.