Stuart McCloskey claims that Ireland's collision with France could be the Six Nations title decider.
McCloskey will face Les Bleus for the first time as Ireland look to end a three match losing streak to their rivals.
The men in green are also striving for their first Six Nations under Andy Farrell and, with Ireland ranked one in the world and France just behind them, it promises to be a seismic match-up.
The Ulster centre said: "Yeah, it's one against two, they haven't lost in 14 games, we're obviously number one in the world.
"But we lost to them last year away so I suppose it's probably the biggest game in the Six Nations, isn't it, us against them - and hopefully it will decide how it goes in the tournament.
"So yeah, it's a massive game."
McCloskey insists that Ireland are "confident" in the build-up, having taken care of business against Wales in the opening round in Cardiff.
"We're normally very good at home, touch wood," he said. "So, going in with confidence but you never know in this game."
As defending champions, France came into the tournament as the team to beat but had a lucky escape in Rome last Sunday.
"Italy are a pretty good team now, it's not a surprise that they put in such a good performance against France," McCloskey reasoned.
"I don't think the French played terribly, it's just that Italy have improved so much over the last few years so there's been things we've been looking at this week, we concentrate more on ourselves than what the French are doing, to be honest."
Ireland's players have previous experience at club level against their counterparts to look back on as well, and McCloskey believes that shows the key is to stay in the game and don't make mistakes against Les Bleus.
"I think I've learned don't kick a kick-off to (Antoine) Dupont against Toulouse, that was a good one when he went the 80 metres at the start," he grimaced, recalling a bad moment for Ulster when the sides met last year.
"They all have unbelievable individual moments. There's times in games when you sit back and are like, 'this guy is out of this world'.
"But I think what I've learned really is that you can grind them down, there's mistakes in them. You stick to your game plan, don't let them get the momentum and get on the front foot and get those wee short balls off 9, you can really get into them.
"You can force mistakes out of them. There's mistakes in them."
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