Jamie George has issued a call to arms and said that his side will “defend our home like every Englishman would” as they seek to stop Ireland laying siege to Twickenham on Saturday. Andy Farrell’s side are red-hot favourites to clinch a fifth straight win against England but George is adamant England can upset the odds and get their Six Nations campaign back on track.
Ireland arrive at Twickenham as favourites with the bookmakers and a bonus-point win would secure the Six Nations title as well as keeping what Steve Borthwick has labelled “the best side in the world” on course for back-to-back grand slams.
England, meanwhile, are still hurting from their capitulation against Scotland according to George and, although they won last time out at home against Wales, they were victorious in just three of their previous 10 matches at Twickenham before that. George, however, believes the underdogs tag suits England and, although he acknowledges his side should never be such big outsiders when playing at home, the captain believes they are capable of pulling off a “huge” result for English rugby.
“We believe that we’re going to win,” said George. “We don’t want anyone, any opposition, to come to Twickenham and have an easy ride. We have respect for them. They’ve got brilliant players across the board. But this is England. This is Twickenham. This is home. And we’re going to defend our home, like every Englishman would.
“Historically [being underdogs] has worked well for us. Fundamentally we don’t want to go in with an underdog title when we’re playing at Twickenham. But at the same time we’re playing against a very, very good team, the best team in the world who we have the utmost respect for. We’ve got to do everything we can to make sure that we play the game on our terms.
“We want to win this game and we know that we can win this game. I think it’d be a huge thing for English rugby if we did because we’ve got a lot of belief from within this squad, that we’re capable of doing very, very special things. We’ve spoken about bringing people with us. A result like this at the weekend would be a huge way of going about that. It’s going to be a tough test, it’s going to take everything that we’ve got, we’re going to need absolutely everyone to be at the top of their game. When we get that, I think we can be a very good team.”
Borthwick has made three changes to the side that lost to Scotland with Immanuel Feyi-Waboso earning a first start and Alex Mitchell and George Martin getting the nod. Mitchell’s return means Danny Care drops to the bench from where he is in line to win his 100th cap – a fitting role for someone who has made 56 of his England appearances as a replacement and all the more special having spent three and a half years in exile under Eddie Jones.
“It means the world to me,” said Care, who is set to become the sixth men’s player to reach three figures after Jason Leonard, Ben Youngs, Owen Farrell, Courtney Lawes and Dan Cole. “We always say playing for England once is an unbelievable thing to do. But I’ve always said it’s been a bit of an addiction for me. Since that first time, I just wanted to do it again and again and again, and it’s why I’ve never given up.
“There was a while where I thought it was never going to happen. And then Steve gave me another opportunity to live the dream and wear the shirt again. And then I had this in the back of my head that I’d love to try to be the sixth male to do it.
“I’ve got three kids now. As a parent you want to inspire your kids and if they can maybe have a look at my career and go: ‘Dad didn’t give up; he kept trying,’ then maybe there’s a message out there for them to believe in yourself and keep going. It would have been quite easy for me to sack it off and not want to do it any more. I’ve always had that drive to wear the shirt again. It might be my last opportunity at Twickenham. I’m desperate to get out there on the weekend and have some fun.”
