CAROLINE WEIR admits she can’t wait to realise her dream of playing in the World Cup and believes Scotland can progress deep into the tournament.

The 23-year-old midfielder, who has already won 63 caps for the national side since making her debut six years ago, flew out to France with her team-mates yesterday (Wednesday) before taking part in the tournament for the first time on Sunday.

Shelley Kerr’s team will open their campaign against England in Nice on Sunday before facing Japan – winners of the competition in 2011 – and Argentina in Group D.

Not since 1998 has a Scottish side performed on the globe’s biggest stage and former Pittencrieff Primary and Dunfermline High school pupil Caroline, a key performer during the historic qualifying campaign, says it will be a proud moment.

A record crowd of 18,555 attended the team’s final warm-up match against Jamaica at Hampden last Tuesday – in which the Manchester City star netted a stunning free kick – and she’s determined to “do the country proud”.

Speaking to Press Sport before departing for France, Caroline said: “We’re realistic in our expectations but we’re also confident in the squad we’ve got.

“We know it’s a really tough group. In terms of the England game, we know their squad very well and they’re a top team, and Japan are so experienced and have had lots of success in World Cups and things like that.

“Argentina, we don’t know as much about them, but it is a World Cup so we know it’s not going to be easy, but our aim is to get out of the group.

“We know that’s something we can achieve with the squad we’ve got. We won’t look too far ahead but that’s definitely our number one aim.

“I think you saw last Tuesday night that we do have the backing of the whole country. There’s so much excitement around our squad at the moment, so it is a really exciting time to be part of, and a proud moment.

“Hopefully, we do the country proud.”

This will be Caroline’s second major tournament with Scotland, having been involved in the European Championships two years ago – scoring the goal that clinched their first-ever finals win against Spain.

Despite a six-goal defeat by England in their opening game, Scotland only missed out on qualification from their group on goal difference, and Caroline continued: “We’re a different squad to what we were two years ago. We’re under new management and play a whole different style of football.

“There was a lot of players missing from the Euros unfortunately due to injury but they’re all back now and I think we’ve really kicked on.

“We only ended up going out by one goal so as much as we had a poor result in the first game, we were pretty close to going through.

“I think it’s the small margins that count so I hope we go into that thinking let’s make them all count because it is a long group stage and anything can happen.”

She added: “What’s great about our squad is that we all work so hard for each other and we’re all so passionate about representing Scotland well and doing a good job, especially as it is our first World Cup.

“The campaign was difficult at times; we really worked hard for it and needed the full squad. People popped up at different moments to get us across the line and our aim when we set out was to qualify.

“That’s done now and our focus for this whole year has been the World Cup. We’ve tried to enjoy it but, at the same time, putting in good preparation to go out there, make something happen and not just make up the numbers.”