These are games you want to play in
England captain Owen Farrell wants the team to have a clear mindset ahead of the Rugby World Cup semi-final.
Eddie Jones’ side face New Zealand in their first last four game in the tournament since 2007 when they reached the final by beating France in their home World Cup.
Farrell, who will start at inside centre in Yokohama on Saturday, says all of their preparations are for games like this.
“It’s exciting,” said Farrell. “These are the ones that you want to be involved in and play in.
“I think that it’s important that you prepare like that and you don’t let perceived things get on top of you and cloud your thinking, we want to be thinking clearly and go about this game like we’re excited to play it.”
The Saracens back though has urged the team to continue playing the way they have been in Japan, which has included 21 tries in four games,
“We’re going to have to play well, I think anybody who has won a semi-final of a World Cup will have played well,” added Farrell.
“I don’t think we have to pull any rabbits out of a hat, we don’t have to do anything that we’ve never done before but we have to be consistent throughout the 80 minutes, we have to play well, we have to do our jobs and that’s what we’re looking to do.
The All Blacks are back-to-back world champions having retained their title in England in 2015 after winning the tournament on home soil in 2011, and they are a team that Farrell has admiration for.
“I have a massive amount of respect for them,” said Farrell.
“For anyone to be at the top for that long it doesn’t come about by doing the same thing over and over, you’ve constantly go to reinvent yourself and constantly got to think of ways of staying ahead of the curve.
“At the same time we’ve done a lot of things right over the past few years and obviously we’re building up to be the best.”
With the game kicking off at 0900 BST this Saturday morning, many England fans will be up early to watch and Farrell is hoping to use the momentum that England’s other sports teams have built up in recent years.
“I think England is a brilliant nation at getting behind their sport teams at big tournaments.
“You only have to look at recent ones to see the momentum it builds back home, and obviously we’re not back home at the minute so we can’t quite see that, but you get a sense of it and I think in terms of that it’s a great nation.”
