Wales vs England: Rhys Webb confident Dragons are not scared of invincible Red Rose
RHYS WEBB insists England’s cloak of invincibility will not scare Wales.
Scrum-half Webb says confidence is high in the Dragons camp ahead of Saturday’s Cardiff crunch.
They finished strongly to beat Italy 33-7 in Rome last weekend and avoid an early Six Nations upset.
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England launched their bid with a laboured 19-16 win over France and given they last lost in October 2015, Eddie Jones’ troops are strongly fancied to lift back-to-back Grand Slams.
And Wales seem happy to let them claim all the limelight — and pressure — that goes with it.
Webb, 28, said: "We watched England live but we didn’t go into too much detail.
"We’ll do a bit of analysis on them this week but the main focus is on us.
"There’s been a lot of talk about England and Ireland, as they played some good rugby over the autumn. But we’ll just keep going about our job.
"Look, we know it’s a massive fixture, a good one for the fans, and everyone is very excited. It’s great it’s at home.
"But we don’t want to get too carried away.
"Winning in Rome was a great start to the campaign. Ours is a very positive environment to be in, a very happy one.
"It is good to see the smiles on people’s faces.
"The wet weather and the passion the Italians showed made life difficult for us.
"But we backed up our confidence in our ability and finished off the game well.
"I feel the boys had a good autumn series, with three wins out of four, so we had great momentum coming in.”
Actually, Wales have looked far from convincing in any of the four wins they have strung together since being monstered by Australia in Cardiff.
Statistically, their 75 per cent win-rate was their best return since 2002.
But scrappy victories over Argentina and Japan and then almost blowing it against the worst South African team in living memory left more questions than answers.
They also struggled to find any fluency for the first hour in Rome and were trailing 7-3 at half-time, before three late tries and the dependable boot of Leigh Halfpenny secured a flattering victory.
That is probably why Wales — who have injury worries over wing George North (thigh) and fly-half Dan Biggar (ribs) from that game — seem reluctant to get dragged into a war of words over the significance of Saturday’s showdown.
He is right. But just try getting a Welsh player to admit it at the moment.