Scotland winger Kyle Steyn insists it’s time for the leaders in the camp to stand up and be counted heading into Sunday’s must-win clash with Australia.

Steyn was among several senior players who underperformed in last weekend’s sobering 43-21 defeat against the All Blacks at Murrayfield.

Scotland had only been three points behind at half-time but failed to score a single point in the second half as New Zealand dominated and ran out emphatic winners.

The likes of captain Sione Tuipulotu, Finn Russell, Zander Fagerson, Ben White and Jack Dempsey were among the other key players who were nowhere near their best.

Tuipulotu held his hands up afterwards having received a costly yellow card in the second half and admitted that the team barely fired a shot after the interval.

Knowing that a victory over the Wallabies is essential if Scotland are to tee up any kind of meaningful fixture in the finals weekend of the Nations Championship, Steyn admits senior players need to step up.

‘It’s been a tough few days to be honest,’ said the Glasgow Warriors skipper. ‘We were gutted that we just didn’t get our game up there consistently enough across the 80 minutes.

‘When New Zealand changed gears early in that second half, they made it really tough for us. That’s something we’ve looked at.

‘To be dead honest, the leaders have taken a good, hard look. I think when we looked at it, New Zealand’s leaders in big moments came up with some really big plays and probably beat our group of leaders in that respect.

‘It wasn’t [just] Sione [with the yellow card]. It was all of us as leaders. We were outperformed by their group of leaders, especially in those big moments.

‘So we’ve looked at ourselves first. You can nitpick and review what went wrong but ultimately it starts with us as leaders.

‘Sione is his own harshest critic, but he’s by no means standing alone on this. We all had a hand in those big moments and we’re grateful that you get an opportunity to go again and bounce back this week against Australia.’

Gregor Townsend did not offer his players any hiding place afterwards and warned that some of them could be dropped for the game against Australia.

Scotland’s defensive record has come under the microscope given the manner in which they have been leaking tries. Lee Radford has now been in position as defence coach for a year, having arrived before the autumn series last year, but his impact has been minimal.

Going back to the Argentina implosion last year where they blew a 21-point lead, Scotland have been losing tries and points at an alarming rate.

On average, they have shipped four tries per match over the past 12 months. They are conceding 33 points per game on average.

John Dalziel, the forwards coach, claimed earlier this week that the defence is not a concern, pointing to the fact that a lot of games are wide open at the moment. But Steyn admits that conceding so many is unsustainable if they are to get back on track heading into next year’s Six Nations and the World Cup.

Asked how much the team have looked at their performance defensively, he said: ‘Yes, massively. Especially because a few of them last week were first phase. That is definitely something that we want to improve on and make a big step up on this week.

‘There’s an element that the game is going there [more open and high scoring]. But I think that puts even more emphasis on the defence because you can’t beat a team if you’re conceding 43 points.

‘The big challenge is to bounce back this week and make sure that we put a real physical defensive performance out there.’

Australia lost 45-22 against England at Twickenham last weekend and will arrive in Edinburgh desperate to bounce back with a win.

Over recent months, the Aussies have beaten South Africa and Argentina but, like Scotland, are a team who are often too inconsistent.

Steyn added: ‘We’re really excited about the challenge and opportunity in that you’ve got two teams that are wounded that are both looking to bounce back.

‘I think that makes the weekend really exciting. The match-up of styles should hopefully make for a really exciting game.

‘You’ve seen the attack that Australia have had over the summer in the Rugby Championship. If you let them get going, they’ve got a really potent attack.

‘For us it’ll be focusing on what we can do because we did show in patches that the systems we’ve got work really well.

‘We just need to put it out there more consistently and be tougher in those longer periods. Both teams will want to fire shots and bounce back, so it should be a good game.

‘Everyone knows how important the next 12 months are with the Rugby World Cup at the end of it. I think everyone will be looking to stress test themselves, put themselves in the deep end as much as we can.

‘We definitely want to do that. Having something to play for and putting yourself in a higher-table clash is definitely something we’re looking towards but we can’t look further than this weekend.

‘We know we’ve got a fired-up Wallabies teams coming here but at the same time, we’re looking to bounce back too.’