Pressure on Waite to inject resilience into brittle Britain

The knives will be out for the Great Britain coach, David Waite, if his fine tuning does not produce a series-saving victory over New Zealand in the second Test at Huddersfield tonight. The Australian still has a year of his contract to run, but he is not so naïve as to imagine that he will not be under pressure to stand aside if the Kiwis clinch the series.

It would be a shame to see any interruption in the long-term, strategic work for which he has been responsible. He is probably right when he says that Great Britain will have real depth of talent – and a winning national side – in five years' time.

But the supporters who endured an inept second half at Blackburn last week want something quicker than that. They want a team that can perform against the two major forces in the world game and they want it now.

That is why the changes he has made are crucial. All Waite's instincts will have been to stick with Karl Pratt, despite his disastrous 40 minutes at Ewood Park, but, in the end, he knew he had to go.

However strong the player's character, his confidence must have been frayed by that experience. To put him in again and chance similar misadventures would be indefensible; if someone else makes a mess of the job, then at least the coach has tried.

Waite's choices for the left wing this evening are risky. Lee Gilmour made a good fist of his short time on the field last week, but has little recent experience of playing on the flank.

Moving Keith Senior there deprives the side of a potential match-winner in the centres. It might also bring back memories of his Great Britain debut – on the wing – in the first Test against the Kiwis in 1998, when he was controversially denied a penalty try when tackled in the air by Robbie Paul.

Senior says he will happily play anywhere for his country; it might make better use of limited resources to pass the chalice to Gilmour – usually a substitute for Bradford, but possibly the least-wrong answer to a dilemma. Whoever plays there can expect plenty of kicks in his direction and plenty of opportunity to observe the phenomenal leaping ability of Henry Fa'afili at close quarters.

There is a risk attached as well to throwing in Paul Sculthorpe for his first game since the Grand Final, but it is one that has to be taken. The word from the camp is that the St Helens man has gradually stepped up his training after his torn thigh muscle and he is likely to be drafted in at loose-forward, provided he comes through a fitness test today. That will leave Kevin Sinfield and the one new cap in the squad, Danny Orr, to divide stand-off duties between them.

Terry O'Connor, rested for the first Test, takes over from his best mate, Barrie McDermott, who was not at his best in Blackburn. O'Connor should typify Great Britain's edge of desperation, because he has decided to retire from international rugby after this series and will not want to go out with another defeat.

The one change forced on Waite, with James Lowes coming in for the injured Keiron Cunningham, could work in his favour. Cunningham was not fully fit even before dislocating his elbow last week and Lowes's ingenuity near the try-line is an ingredient Britain badly need.

The scale of the task, in front of what should be close to a capacity crowd at the McAlpine Stadium, is underlined by the way that the Kiwis could even contemplate dropping Paul, arguably their man of the match at Blackburn, against opposition including eight of his Bradford team-mates.

Gary Freeman might have a squad that is light on numbers, but it is high in quality and his problem has been who to leave out. Waite's is to coax a more resilient performance from a brittle team.

The depressing thing about them in recent games is not that they are uniformly bad from start to finish, but that it only takes a mistake or two to bring the edifice crashing down. They, and he, cannot afford that again tonight.