ULSTER hooker Rory Best reckons England will be out to destroy Ireland's maul in order to derail Joe Schmidt's Triple Crown tilt.
He warned that England forwards coach Graham Rowntree will whip his men into a frenzy to dismantle Ireland's driving weapon at Twickenham on Saturday.
Best worked under Rowntree on last summer's British and Irish Lions tour to Australia, and knows the former Leicester man prioritises "physical dominance".
"There's been a lot made of our maul, so he'll want to make a point of destroying that," said Best. "He played in a very physical Leicester team, that's his grounding, that's what he expects from his players.
"It's all about physical dominance with him. You dominate up front, you dominate the game. And he'll be drumming that into them all week, there's no doubt about that. There'll be a lot of technical aspects, but a lot of it will also come down to mindset."
Irish head coach Joe Schmidt has named a 33-man training group that will complete final preparations for the game. He has been boosted by the return to action of lock Donnacha Ryan, who played for the first time since December in Munster's 36-8 home victory over Zebre in the RaboDirect Pro12 on Saturday.
Ryan will compete with Iain Henderson and Mike McCarthy for a slot on the bench to cover the starting second row pair of captain Paul O'Connell and Devin Toner.
Schmidt's extended squad shows few changes, save for the return of fit-again back-three operator Felix Jones, with wing Fergus McFadden and scrum-half Eoin Reddan also available after injury. Isaac Boss is expected to recover from concussion in time to contest selection.
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