Steve Borthwick’s England have vowed to show their nasty side as they attempt to finally wrestle back the Calcutta Cup.
Scotland arrive at Twickenham tomorrow on the back of four straight wins over the English and unbeaten at HQ since 2017.
Borthwick’s side finally got a monkey off their back by beating France 26-25 a fortnight ago and are desperate to back it up by laying the Scottish hoodoo to rest.
And they are determined to be poor hosts by bringing a hard edge to the game against Finn Russell and co.
Scrum coach Tom Harrison said: “We’ve spoken about it as a group, everyone says teams that play against England, they find a bit extra but actually there’s a nastiness to us. We want to bring the Calcutta Cup back here. “
Tom Curry reported in the week that England’s training has had an edge to it at their Bagshot base and fellow back row Tom Willis is backing them to bring it to the game.
The No.8 said: “The way we compete with each other in the week sets the tone for the weekends. Naturally you need an element of nastiness in you, from that competitive side of things, to push each other on. It gives you that competitive edge.”
Russell plays club rugby at Bath with Ollie Lawrence and Ted Hill and Scottish prop Will Hurd is at Leicester with England’s Ollie Chessum and bench prop Joe Heyes.
Harrison added: “There are loads of blokes playing week in, week out with these players and if you lose to someone you have to wear it for a whole year.
“Every day when you go into the club you know they have got the better of you. Everyone has got their different reasons why they want to win and how deep that hurt goes.”
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