Eddie Jones: England boss questions whether Ireland can match up physically

Eddie Jones believes Ireland will struggle to face up to his England side’s physicality as they have not faced up to a team as powerful in recent times.

Ireland travel to Twickenham on Saturday and the winner of the game will be the only side able to catch table-toppers and Grand Slam hopefuls France.

Jones believes Ireland are favourites and revealed that his team were written off by a barista who agreed with the opinions of former Ireland player Jamie Heaslip and Stephen Ferris, who said his team are battling at the moment.

Andy Farrell’s men were edged 30-24 by a highly impressive France in round two, but a defiant Jones still believes that Saturday’s collision will be step up they are unable to handle.

“Ireland haven’t played against a team like us before – they haven’t played against South Africa since 2017,” Jones said.

“We played against South Africa last year and did well in those physical stakes, so we intend to really take it to them.

“We play with a physicality they haven’t seen before. I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do on Saturday.

“We have one intention in this game and that’s to go after Ireland. We are going to chase them hard down the street.

“Everywhere they go, we’re going to be in their faces and we’re going to take time and space away from them. Do we enjoy that challenge? Yes.

“This team don’t know how good they can be and we are certainly going to find out on Saturday how good we can be.”

Since falling at Murrayfield on the opening weekend, England have stitched together solid wins against Italy and Wales, but the demands increase significantly over the next two weekends.

A feature of their Six Nations has been an attack that has ignited only in brief spurts as they get to grips with a