What to do when the snow is falling and you’re stuck in a hotel on the outskirts of Dublin? Well, if you’re not studying England’s lineout patterns on video, you might be having a private audience with Christy Moore — and Paul McGrath.

They were here on Wednesday night. Christy’s a mate of Rala, our bag-man (sorry, our kit technician) and he’s a big fan of Irish rugby. He was actually very humble about not taking up too much of our time. We had to scream for more.

Christy’s brother Luka Bloom was there, too. He even pulled out a song about John Hayes scoring that try out on the wing against Scotland — The Creature of Mass Destruction, he called it. We all joined in on the chorus.

Meeting Paul McGrath was a real treat. I’m a United fan and he was a hero of mine growing up. It was quite a role reversal, us bringing out the pens for the photos and autographs.

It’s not the first time Christy has played for us. I hope he doesn’t mind me saying this, but his record ain’t great — played two lost two. The most recent one was before the Grand Slam decider against England two years ago. They beat us 42-6.

That day, I think we let the moment get to us a bit. There was so much at stake and I reckon we got a bit nervous. Things have changed a bit since then. It’s quite amazing to be going into a game against England as favourites. I don’t think any of our guys are thinking in those terms. We all have the utmost respect for this England team. Their results have been poor by their standards but it’s been more a case of them losing games rather than their opponents winning.

They may be in transition but you need only look back at what they did to South Africa in November.

Whereas we had battled to beat the Boks the previous week, England ripped them apart. They have a big pack with a lot of guys from Leicester and Bath and real danger men in the backs such as Josh Lewsey and Jason Robinson.

Unless our defence is exemplary, they’ll score tries. And if we start the same way as in the past two games, we could be 20 points down after 20 minutes.

A fair few of the England players know what it’s like to win at Lansdowne Road and they’ll be desperate to salvage their season. There’s still huge pressure on them but all it takes is beating us and they know that. They’ll be right up for it.

We’re confident in our ability and feel we can win. At the same time, it’s no harm to know what their motivation will be.

On the technical front, I know the Bath guys such as Danny Grewcock and Matt Stevens will take a lot of encouragement from their performance at the set-pieces against Leinster at The Rec early in January. They will hope to upset myself and Munch (Shane Byrne) again.

It was strange the way things happened that day. It felt we were making all our season’s mistakes in one game. To quote a certain Cork man’s analogy of the event, it was like taking out your driver on the first tee, smashing it into the woods and then doing the same thing all the way around the course instead of being cute and pulling out an iron. It was a good lesson for us.

Shane was a bit low afterwards, as low as I’ve seen him, to be honest. It wasn’t only his fault but he’s very self-critical — that’s why he’s where he is. At the same time, there’s so much pressure on hookers.

You can see it in the dressing room beforehand. Shane’s not screaming and shouting like a lot of us. He’s sitting down, probably psyching himself up for the first lineout. He’s got to pull the right one from what’s a pretty large menu. You get the first few right and you can settle into the game. Lose one or two and it can add pressure to the thrower.

The way the game has developed the hookers’ throwing has had to become more precise and a good thrower is worth his weight in gold. The relationship between hooker and jumpers can be the difference between winning and losing your throw.

England also have a very strong lineout and their percentages are quite high. Against Wales and France they managed to get enough of their ball.Not all of it was clean but, at the same time, they can mess up the quality of the opposition ball.

They have four top-class jumpers in their two locks and backrowers, with two more sitting on the bench, while the lineout is the forte of their coach, Andy Robinson. You can be sure they’ve been doing as much homework as us.

I think we have the balance right between work, rest and play. Last week we had four days off, which was great, especially after two Tests back to back. I had time to catch up with my girlfriend and see what she looks like. The two of us went off for a night in Galway, which was cool, and met a few friends. Very refreshing.

Back at base camp, the mood has been pretty good all week. We got a great laugh out of Guy Easterby’s reconstruction of the scene in his Edinburgh hotel room. In the middle of Saturday night Maggsy learnt that his wife, Jane, had gone into labour. He was so excited and in such a state of panic that he couldn’t organise a flight home — the Easterby boys had to do the honours over the internet.

Maggsy caught a taxi from Edinburgh at 5am for a 7am flight out of Glasgow and got to the hospital in Belfast for the arrival of Jessica. Happy days.

This week has been a good combination of hard training and lighthearted fun. We don’t want to be overly nervous before one of the biggest games of this squad’s career. Friday’s session was one of our best. Everybody was up for it. Guys have been in and out of the video room working hard. When the snow comes down, it’s good to chuck a few snowballs and relieve the tension. The spirit is good and there’s no reason is shouldn’t be.