No-one knows better what his men are up against than Dave Rennie as he prepares his Glasgow Warriors to face old friends and foes at Scotstoun tonight.

It is by no means the first time the native New Zealander has pitted his wits against those of former Scotland coach Vern Cotter, but he is more used to having another of their compatriots, ex-All Black stand off Aaaron Cruden, on his side.

In anticipating the back-to-back clashes with their Montpellier side he was full of respect for both men, however.

“Vern is hugely respected in New Zealand,” said his fellow Kiwi.

“I coached against him when he was coaching Bay of Plenty. He did a great job there, had a stint at Crusaders and then moved to Clermont. He is a tough operator and he will be demanding physicality from his team, but he is an innovative thinker around the game as well.”

And in Cruden the Warriors coach knows better than most just why Cotter can have confidence that he has a play-maker with the full range of abilities to implement whatever strategy he comes up with.

“I think he is one of the best 10s in the world if not the best 10,” said Rennie.

“I worked with him for a hell of a lot of years at Manawatu, New Zealand 20s and at the Chiefs.

“He has a great understanding of the game and he is really driven, very professional.

“He has a very attacking mindset. It's a bit different for me to be coaching against him but I'm looking forward to it.”

Nor does he think the only problems will be generated by his countrymen

“They have too many (threats) to mention,” he said.

“(Springbok hooker) Bismarck du Plessis is back from injury and they have a huge backline… the two South African boys in midfield are both big men.

“They have Nemani (Nandolo) on one side of the field and (Benjamin) Fall on the other and they are unbelievable athletes.”

However he believes his men have learned from this season’s previous experiences in this competition, when they were over-powered by Exeter Chiefs and Leinster.

Those were their only defeats of this season so far, but they came at the worst possible time, making their task in seeking to reach the quarter-finals close to impossible.

However Rennie still believes they can do it and is looking forward to seeing how his men cope with the pressure tonight.

“The Pro14 is a marathon and Europe is a sprint,” he said.

“We didn’t get it right in those two games. We learned a lot from them but losing put us under a bit of pressure.

“If you drop a couple of games in the pro14 you have time to claw that back. We played pretty good sides and did not play well enough, learned a bit and hopefully we can show that tomorrow.

“We're looking forward to it. We’ve defended very well but we will find out a bit more about our boys under the blowtorch tomorrow night.”