England vs Wales: Manu Tuilagi has been fast-tracked back as his size is essential in modern rugby

No player in European rugby runs 'the suicide line' more effectively than Manu Tuilagi, one of the sport's scariest backs

England centre Manu Tuilagi (Getty Images)

We call it the “suicide line” – an angle of attack designed to cause maximum damage to the opposition midfield defence – and on a good day, no player in European rugby runs it more effectively or destructively than Manu Tuilagi, whose freakish combination of pace, power and body shape makes him one of the scariest backs in the sport. He’s had his injury problems since first breaking into the England team five years ago and I can’t imagine he’s match-hard so soon after his latest comeback, but I fully understand the decision to fast-track him for today’s game against Wales.

This is the contest at the heart of the Six Nations. If England make home advantage count, they will be odds-on favourites for the title even if France win comfortably in Edinburgh tomorrow. If Wales stage a repeat of their famous backs-against-the-wall World Cup victory last September, they will be all but certain to take the spoils. Under the circumstances, we can expect the physicality level to be off the scale.

Which is where Manu comes in. When I was a member of Martin Johnson’s coaching team in the run-up to the 2011 World Cup, he was the answer to our prayers. At that time, the Springboks and others were fielding back divisions full of 105kg-plus specimens, while we were working with midfielders like Mathew Tait and Jamie Noon – terrific players in many ways, but far from the biggest. There was a size-physicality deficit and it explained why Mike Tindall was so important for so long. We played the poor bloke into the ground for the simple reason that we needed people capable of manhandling the opposition and giving them a taste of their own medicine.

Manu’s potential genuinely excited us, especially as Toby Flood understood precisely how the “suicide line” theory worked and we had a brilliant support runner like Chris Ashton who could track Manu every step of the way and capitalise on the mayhem he created. It didn’t always go according to plan, but our opponents were uncomfortably aware of the threat we posed.

You only have to look at the way Wales under Warren Gatland have constructed their attacking game to see why Eddie Jones is so keen on an English version of what has become known as “Warrenball”. Jamie Roberts, George North… these are backs constructed on an unusually generous scale and – let’s be honest here – they have the necessary equipment to hurt their opponents, physically as well as figuratively.

Roberts on the stampede five metres short of the line? He takes a hell of a lot of stopping. North roaming off his wing and taking a short pass at full tilt close to the set-piece, as he did so memorably against Scotland in round two? It’s a serious proposition for any defence. England would love a piece of that action and when you boil it all down, it’s not obvious that they need both George Ford and Owen Farrell in their midfield when someone like Manu is in his pomp.

If England are to win this game they have to win the collisions, so one of the principal fascinations of this afternoon’s contest will be Eddie’s answer to the “JR” question. My mind goes back to the Six Nations match in Cardiff in 2009, when we identified Roberts as a key danger and came up with a special plan to neutralise him.

In fact, it was Mike Ford, our defence coach, who successfully argued that we should run our most reliable tackler, the back-rower Joe Worsley, in the back line – a move that meant Andy Goode, our outside-half, would have to scrummage as a flanker on the Welsh put-in. It was a smart call. The game was tight and we finished marginally on the wrong side of the ledger, but Joe’s performance was a minor masterpiece of execution.

I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if Shaun Edwards, the Wales defence strategist, tries something equally inventive in an effort to stop Billy Vunipola dead in his tank tracks. The England No 8 is among the form players in the tournament and it may be that he sees an awful lot of Toby Faletau, his opposite number (not to mention his cousin), in man-to-man marking mode. I’d fork out good money for a match ticket, just to see those two go at it in a family-friendly kind of way.

One thing is certain: they’ll both be in the fight when it comes to the line-out drives. England fancy themselves in this department, but the Welsh forwards are among the best in the world at stopping the unstoppable. I admire their work in this area, because it says so much about their collective personality of the coaching team. During Johnno’s time with England, he said that defending against the maul was 20 per cent tactics and 80 per cent heart. I used to come up with all sorts of cunning smoke-and-mirrors ruses aimed at protecting our line, but he and his fellow hard-heads – John Wells, Graham Rowntree – wouldn’t countenance it. “Nah,” they’d say. “Forget the clever stuff. This is mano a mano.”

So who wins today? It’s so tough to call. There’s a saying down here in Australia that you have to have played a Grand Final to win a Grand Final and as Wales are the ones with the hardened experience, it could be England are still a big game away from beating them. Wales may be an ageing team, but I don’t get the whiff of a side going backwards down a slippery slope.

There again, the Twickenham factor should benefit England: their victory over Ireland may not have been comprehensive on the scoreboard, but if they hadn’t butchered so many opportunities early on, the game would have been dead by half-time. I’m happy to duck out of predicting the outcome of this one. I’ll just make myself comfortable down here in Sydney and wait for the shockwaves to reach me through the television screen.

Brian Smith was England’s attack coach between 2008 and 2011.