THERE has been a fair amount of twaddle floating round this week after Cornell Du Preez was brought into the Scotland squad preparing to take on Argentina this weekend. Thank goodness we have Tim Visser, the earliest of the current crop of non-Scots who has been able to don the Dark Blue on residential grounds, to bring a bit of common sense to the discussion.

"I'm not going to criticise the process through which I've become eligible," he said. "If you look at other sports it's maybe slightly unusual, but it's a level playing field for every country. As long as the rule exists, that's the way it is. There's no point in me, as a player, criticising it.

"It's the only way I personally could have played competitive international rugby. I can only say that it is an unusual rule but, fortunately for myself, it is the rule."

Visser is in a slightly different position to the so-called "project players". When he arrived in Scotland it was more a case of the final throw of the dice in saving his career than with any thought of playing international rugby.

That Andy Robinson, who brought him to Edinburgh before moving on to take charge of Scotland, Rob Moffatt and Michael Bradley realised how good he could be and found ways to play to his strengths was a huge bonus for him, his club and then his adopted country.

Du Preez follows more in the footsteps of fellow South Africans WP Nel and Josh Strauss who always knew caps were on the cards if they stayed long enough, but since every country that can sue these rules does, there is no reason for the Scots to take a stand.

Long since accepted as a core part of the Scotland set-up, Dutch-born Visser is more worried about his form, where he is happy to report he feels he is getting back to the kind of level that brought him from obscurity to the Test arena.

"I feel I have discovered a bit of the old Tim, how I used to be back in the day at Edinburgh when, basically, I got a lot of the ball. That's incredibly exciting for me as a winger," he said. "You want to be on the end of things and scoring tries. At the end of the day, as a winger, you benefit from what happens around you. At a team like Harlequins we play a lot of creative rugby and a lot gets created for me. Which makes it a lot easier for me as a winger."

Visser's early career with Edinburgh was a lesson in how to score tries, with club and PRO12 records following. Even now that he has gone to England, he is still second in the all-time PRO12 try list, only six behind Tommy Bowe, who has played many more games and has not played for a team that struggled the way Edinburgh did during Visser's time in the capital.

The turning point in his career was the broken leg in 2013 that kept him out for almost all that season and when he did return, found that Alan Solomons was determined to impose a far more conservative game plan than the one that had brought all those scores.

"I feel like I have taken a lot out of that period under Solly [Solomons]," Visser maintained "Defensively I feel I have grown as a player and benefited from that time when I was getting less ball and was focusing on other aspects of my game. I've become a more well-rounded player.

"It is incredibly exciting to be a part of a back five [at Scotland] with some incredible talent. It's only going to make people get better. You saw that in the World Cup when Rory [Hughes] and Damien [Hoyland] came in and competed hard for places, it pushed everyone on. No-one was really sure of their spot.

"That's the kind of situation you want, not only for when there are injuries but to make everyone better in the long term."

Argentina are six places lower than Australia in the World Rankings and a Scotland win would move them into the top eight with less than a year to go before the World Cup draw, but Visser has seen enough of their South American opponents to know there is no room for complacency.

"One of their wingers looks enormous – Manuel Montero," he said. "The little guy Santiago Cordero is really handy as well, he's got an incredible step; I actually find that harder to defend against. It brings different challenges.

"They've got quality throughout. If you look at what they did at the World Cup last year, they're a very good side and we're certainly not underestimating them at all.

"Before they started playing in the Rugby Championship they were a completely different team all the time. At home they would play a lot of their home-based players and for the major tournaments they would bring in the big dogs. Now they have a more steady team in terms of their starters and you can start to see a pattern emerge in how they play."