England need Ireland to go down to 14 or 13 – Heaslip

Ireland must be reduced to “14 or 13 players” in order for England to win Saturday’s Six Nations game at Twickenham, says former Irish number eight Jamie Heaslip.

England, whose Grand Slam hopes were ended by Scotland last time out, could welcome back fly-half Marcus Smith.

England are winless in their past four meetings with Ireland.

“I haven’t seen what the bookies are saying, but in order for England to win, Ireland have to go down to like 14 or 13 players and I think England need a couple of trick plays up their sleeve,” Heaslip, who won 95 Ireland caps, told the Rugby Union Daily podcast.

Interestingly, the past four encounters have featured a red card. Ireland centre Bundee Aki was sent off in the 2021 Six Nations encounter, and England’s Charlie Ewels dismissed after just 82 seconds at Twickenham in 2022.

Freddie Steward’s red card dashed England’s hopes of stopping an Irish Grand Slam in Dublin last year, while Billy Vunipola was also sent off when the sides met at Aviva Stadium in a World Cup warm-up match in August.

While Ireland have endured some humbling defeats at Twickenham down the years, Heaslip believes the team’s mentality has been changed with Farrell’s side losing just five times since the beginning of 2021.

“They only know winning,” two-time British and Irish Lions tourist Heaslip said of Farrell’s squad.

“It’s a pretty powerful mindset coming into it and fills them with confidence. It kind of reminds me of that Richie McCaw-Dan Carter side with New Zealand.

“That period from 2007 to the 2015 World Cup when they were just so, so dominant.

“It builds a bit of a flywheel momentum for these guys. They don’t take anything for granted, that’s for sure.

“Andy Farrell won’t let them take anything for granted. They’re not fearful of going there [Twickenham] now but they should definitely understand the history between the two sides.

“Farrell is definitely one of the best people to remind them of that.”

The last time Ireland travelled to Twickenham as reigning Grand Slam champions was back in 2010, when Tommy Bowe’s late try lifted the visitors to a 20-16 win and ended England’s hopes of a clean sweep.

“For us, it was huge,” recalls Heaslip, who also captained Ireland against England in 2013.

“I remember going there in 2008 and getting it served to us particularly at the scrum.

“I will never forget, particularly being at eight, all day just having this scrum come back on me and it was a nightmare, they were just so physically dominant.

“I remember going into it [in 2010] thinking ‘we can’t let that happen, we can’t let them stake their claim on this’.

“We had a couple of, not tricks up our sleeve, but plays that could help expose that and Tommy’s one [breaking through the seam of the line-out to score his try] encapsulated that.”