O'Driscoll has faith in the familiar

Captain's view: Familiarity has brought a cosy, comforting presence to the Ireland squad as they prepare for the fourth leg of a potential Grand Slam. Same faces, same venues, same pre-match minutiae but without inducing the boredom that often accompanies routine.

Brian O'Driscoll confirmed as much as he mused over Saturday's assignment at Lansdowne Road when Ireland will try to sidestep France before swiftly decamping to Cardiff and the prospect of a winner take all shoot-out with Wales.

There is a great deal of rugby to be played, not just in Dublin but at Murrayfield on Sunday when the Welsh take on Scotland, before the Six Nations gets the sort of climax that most Celts crave. France is a huge impediment to Irish ambition and possess the footballing nous to cut a swathe through the hype.

O'Driscoll and his cohorts are too intelligent to look beyond the weekend. Ireland's captain explained: "One aspect of our professionalism that has impressed me over the last while. We have always done the same amount of homework, the same research, the same amount of video analysis into every side that we have played in the last year, no matter whether they are the minnows of world rugby or world champions."

The hoary old chestnut about Ireland's aversion to the mantle of favourites is something that O'Driscoll is keen to debunk.

"I don't think we look on ourselves as favourites or underdogs. We are level pegging with France. We both have another couple of gears to kick through. I don't think you can put a tag on this one."

It is not as if the players are impervious to the soaring expectation levels of their advocates in the terraces and stands or the inescapable fact that the team aren't exactly short of ambition. O'Driscoll acknowledges the pressure, a by-product of success.

"An element of nervousness does come into things, that's only natural," he says. "That's part of trying to better yourself as a player, to deal with that expectation and try and play your natural game. That's where the better teams shine through, when there's that extra element of pressure brought on you, that you're able to perform as if it wasn't there."

France are an enigma, capable of the sublime and the ridiculous as they demonstrated in their most recent outing in Paris. But no matter which incarnation takes the field on Saturday, O'Driscoll points to a constant in their performances: they don't give away too many tries.

"They have one of the most difficult defensive systems to break down. They leak very few tries. We'll have our work cut out scoring five pointers against them. It's important to get quick ruck ball which is the key to (unlocking) it and also bringing them through the phases.

"Eventually you'll find mismatches if you bring teams through enough phases. We have to hang onto the ball and remain as patient as we possibly can. There are going to be times when you find yourself going backwards but you just have to continue to recycle the ball and those mismatches, the one-on-ones, a back against a forward will hopefully work out for us."

With Gordon D'Arcy and Shane Horgan out injured, Ireland coach Eddie O'Sullivan is fortunate to be able to call upon the experienced figure of Kevin Maggs to partner O'Driscoll in midfield, a combination that the latter guesses has played together "30 to 35 times".

"Obviously it's not the perfect situation but having said that you're bringing someone in that has 67 Tests that's capable of doing an excellent job, has done for Ireland in the past so I guess it's a new challenge for myself and Maggsie. In a competition like this you have to deal with injuries and that's what we'll do.

"We know each other's game very well. I got my first Test with Maggsie and in this week's training we have slotted back in as we left off. Whenever he has come in to play for Ireland he has done a magnificent job. He'll certainly bring back some hard lines of running to our game.

"We don't want to be nearly men. We want something tangible. We have found ourselves in similar situations over the last few years winning four games out of the five but we want to go further than that, to achieve something that we look back on and take pride in some time in the future."

They can make a sizeable down-payment on that this Saturday.