The figurehead forward of the Samoan side that turned their tiny country into a significant presence on the rugby map of the 1990s, Lam alloyed skill and athleticism to levels of workrate that made him one of the most effective players of his era.

In the latter stages of his career, Lam brought those qualities to Europe, becoming the key player in both the Newcastle Falcons Premiership winning side of 1998 and the Northampton team that lifted the Heineken Cup two years later. With a background at Auckland, then the pre-eminent province in New Zealand rugby, you could say he developed a taste for success, but it was never so strong as to persuade him that he should not give something back to the less privileged parts of the game.

And no, we are not talking of the time he spent assisting Ian McGeechan as forwards mentor to the Scotland team, rather his current incarnation as head coach of the Pacific Islanders, the combined side of Samoa, Fiji and Tonga, who are due to arrive in Edinburgh this afternoon ahead of next Saturday's test against Scotland at Murrayfield. After a demanding season at the helm for Auckland, Lam might have been tempted to put his feet up for a few weeks, but his commitment to growing the island game is such that he was happy to put his weight behind it again.

Individually, the Pacific islands have long been recognised as jewels in rugby's crown, but in recent years the suspicion has developed that it is only by combining their strengths into an amalgamated side that they will ever be able to overcome the problems of population, geography and finance that see them stuck in the sport's second tier. But Lam does not believe the Pacific nations should have to give up their particular identities to benefit from the combined format.

"In many ways, the strength of what we have here is that it is like the British Lions, " he explains. "The guys are excited to be part of it because they are representing the very elite of three different countries. That's a great honour for them, something they can be really proud of achieving.

"But I still think it should stay as an occasional thing.

For instance, I'd hate to see a Pacific Islands side playing in the World Cup at the expense of the three nations from which they're drawn. If you don't keep the individual identities of Samoa, Tonga and Fiji, you'll kill off a lot of rugby in those places, which would be exactly the opposite of what we're trying to achieve."

In actual fact, the Pacific Islanders' officials face a far greater logistical nightmare than their Lions counterparts ever experience, as they try to assemble their squad from players based in every major rugby country on earth. Even then, the job is only half done, as they discovered last Wednesday when Rupeni Caucaunibuca, the Agenbased Fijian wing whose unpredictable habits are not limited to the pitch, pulled out of the side to face Wales yesterday, claiming he had lost his passport.

"It's a big ask for us to come together in such a short space of time, " Lam says. "We haven't had an ideal preparation, as I hadn't coached them as a group before and I only met some of them for the first time last Sunday.

Having said that, they have gelled together really well and they're all pretty determined to do well."

Lam never actually stayed in Scotland during the time he helped McGeechan, but he has retained an affection for the country that gave him his first taste of coaching at international level.

"Even watching from afar I've been really pleased for Scotland, the way they've played and the way certain players have developed.

There's a lot of fantastic young players coming through as well as the old campaigners like Scott Murray and Chris Paterson. All in all it looks like the national team is in a pretty good state."