Scotland v South Africa: Andy Robinson likely to play it safe despite World Cup seeding on the line Against that, Geoff Cross, who covered Murray's tighthead position against the All Blacks, had one of his best games for Scotland. The Edinburgh prop held up well in the scrum, and put the icing on the cake of a conspicuously effective performance in the loose when he collected his first try for his country just before half-time. Robinson has form in this regard, refusing to bring Murray straight back into his starting XV after he had missed a couple of Sunday matches in this year's RBS Six Nations tournament. A more radical move still might be to drop Ross Ford, the Lions hooker whose line-out work last weekend was far from assured. In the backline, Edinburgh fly-half Greig Laidlaw could be vulnerable to a challenge from Ruaridh Jackson, the Glasgow playmaker who appeared to add urgency to the attack when he came off the replacements" bench late in the second half. Against that, Jackson's kicking statistics this season have hovered around the 50 per cent mark, far short of the accuracy required against such a forward-oriented side as South Africa. For all the points they shipped against New Zealand, Scotland lost no ground in the IRB world rankings table, where they still hold ninth position. By contrast, Ireland slipped down one rung, from seventh to eighth, after their loss to South Africa, trading places with Argentina, who won comfortably against Wales in the Millennium Stadium. As a consequence, Argentina have all but nailed down the top-eight position that has become all important in determining pool seedings for the 2015 World Cup. Scottish fans who had hoped and prayed for an Argentine loss to Wales will now be rooting for the Pumas when they take on Ireland in Dublin on Nov 24. If the Scots can beat South Africa by at least 15 points on Saturday they will almost certainly claim the eighth place they cherish and thereby avoid being placed among third-tier sides for the World Cup, the very scenario that led them to miss out on a place in the quarter-finals at last year's tournament. If they win by fewer than 15 points, or even lose narrowly, their World Cup seeding will come down to what they can do against Tonga in Aberdeen the following weekend. There is also a very slim chance that Wales, Grand Slam champions only a few months ago, could slip out of the top eight, largely as a consequence of their three straight losses to Australia over summer and last weekend's defeat by Argentina. Cleverly, the Irish have deemed their meeting with Fiji in Limerick this weekend to be a non-Test international, a status that means they will not surrender any ranking points if the Pacific islanders can pull off a shock victory.