Despite being born and spending most of his life Down Under, Hines insists he pays no more attention to the fortunes of Saturday’s opponents than any other nation.

Asked if it was a special feeling coming up against the Wallabies, the 32-year-old said: “Not really, no. It’s just about playing against the 15 players opposite you on the other side of the field.

“It’s the same feeling for me playing for Scotland. Every time is special and I just want to get a victory over whoever’s in front of me.”

And Hines’ ambivalence about taking on the country of his birth extends to keeping tabs on their progress, with the lock only having done so recently because of this weekend’s clash.

“I normally don’t follow their fortunes but obviously the last couple of games I’ve been keeping an eye on,” he said ahead of what will be his third meeting with Australia but his first for five years.

“Last weekend against Ireland, they were strong around the breakdown area and in the scrum. Australia are a really well-organised team and if they see an error in the defensive line in front of them, they’re quick to exploit it.”

A couple of years ago, Australia would have been ruing losing Hines to Scotland, so bad had their forward play become.

They have since turned the set piece into a real strength, though Hines believes the line-out may be one area where they can still be put under pressure in this weekend’s second autumn international.

“They haven’t been particularly dominant in the line-out in the last couple of games,” said Hines, who will earn his 60th cap this weekend.

“But it’s just about our performance and what we do. We’ve got to do everything we do to the best of our ability and we can’t really focus too much on them or we’ll lose our own focus.

“As long as we look after our own performance and are in control of how we play then we’ll be fine.”

Robinson has demanded a 15% improvement from his side on last weekend’s win over Fiji in his own game in charge.

Hines revealed he and his team-mates were on course to do that but warned: “There’s no use having that level of intensity in training if you’re not going to do it in the game.”

Having been on the Test scene since 2000, Hines has seen plenty of chances for Scotland to improve their miserable record of one win in 43 matches against the Tri-Nations come and go.

They have also not beaten Australia since 1982, losing their last 16 meetings.

But Hines said: “We can’t worry about 27 years of history. “All we’ve got to worry about is the game at the weekend.

“History is history - maybe we can make a little bit of our own. It’s a bit too early to say that, isn’t it? But it’d be a great result nonetheless.”