OUR own Caelan Doris is in fighting form ahead of Saturday's pivotal Six Nations clash with Italy.
The Lacken man is excited about the clash and says his Irish side are ready for the cahllenge of Italy, who defeated Scotland last weekend.
Ireland have made six changes from the squad defeated by France in the opening game and Caelan says nobody is shirking from the challenge.
“It's an exciting team we've got tomorrow,” he stated after today's captain’s run at Aviva Stadium. “There's obviously a few changes, so getting cohesion through the week has been important. And the message to those guys is to trust themselves.

“Same with all of us really off the back of a defeat like that on Thursday, doubling down on what we're good at doing things properly with intent, enjoying it and enjoying it from doing things properly with intent as well.

“Creating a feeling through how we show up with actions and it can be infectious that but also to the new guys it's making sure they own it and make it feel like it's properly theirs.

"You can't have any passengers tomorrow, so, yeah, full ownership from everyone.”

Doris has been impressed by Edwin Edogbo’s impact since the 23-year-old powerhouse arrived into the Ireland camp ahead of the pre-championship training week in Portugal and was reminded of his physicality during a showreel of the Cobh Pirates product’s on-field impacts which was shown at the Ireland team’s jersey presentation ceremony on Thursday night, also attended by the debutant’s mother and three siblings.

“He's been class. I’ve faced him in a few interpros, and he's unbelievably physical, but he's got a very good understanding of the game as well.

“We saw some of his clips yesterday, his family were in and there was a highlight reel for him and some of his involvements in Munster have been unbelievable, especially around the breakdown actually. He's very capable there of turnovers.

“So yeah, I'm excited to see him getting his hands on the ball tomorrow, he's got a very good way of beating defenders both through his size, but footwork and agility as well. So yeah, I'm excited for him.”

Doris said “intent” had been the squad’s word of the week following Farrell’s stinging post-match criticism of his players at Stade de France.

“I think there's probably a little bit of a feeling of not wanting to make a mistake as opposed to going out to get it right and properly set down a marker last week.

“So it has been the word of the week and we're hoping to see that tomorrow.

“There's been several chats throughout the week, The big thing has been about holding each other more accountable as a leadership group, as a wider group… all of us taking full ownership and driving things in the right direction.

“We've kind of spoken a little bit about last week being a reference point that we will hopefully look back on from, a place of improvement over the next this week, but also going forward as well.

“There's a realisation that we do need to improve, but there is still belief in what we're doing, and just the need to do things properly.”