Saints players can't wait to test themselves at iconic stadiums, says boss Dowson

Having just come off a run of four successive home matches, all of which Dowson’s men won, they now face trips to two iconic stadiums.

Saints will travel to Twickenham to take on Harlequins in a key Gallagher Premiership game on Saturday afternoon (kick-off 3.05) before going to Croke Park in Dublin a week later to face Leinster in the semi-finals of the Investec Champions Cup.

And Dowson said: “You want to play in great stadiums that you've seen on TV, which have such great heritage and you want to be in front of crowds that are either baying for your blood or cheering you through a brick wall.

"We're excited about the fact we're giving ourselves the opportunity to go and enjoy those sorts of environments.

"We've talked about it over the last four weeks at home, about how brilliant some of those opportunities have been. We've played Sarries at home, a round of 16 against Munster, then the Bulls and then derby day.

"Now we're going to go on the road, to one of the best stadiums to play rugby, against Quins who have got a great record there.

"Hopefully it will be a big crowd, a great day and we can get stuck into that.”

Saints have already won some hugely difficult away matches this season, beating the likes of Saracens, Glasgow Warriors and Munster on their travels.

So are Dowson’s side now more comfortable on the big stage?

"I'd have to tell you that after the game," he said.

"There’s a confidence around what we're doing, in the group as a whole and in themselves.

“I don't doubt the fact that some of the lads have been playing international rugby helps that.

“Clearly, getting results off the back of good performances helps that as well so there's definitely some momentum there but whether or not people are used to playing at Twickenham, I'll tell you next week.”

Quins, like Saints, are chasing a play-off place this season.

And Dowson said: “They're a very good side, putting on a show and that's what they like to do.

“They've got so many quality players to do it.

“We're going to have to be right at our best but we're excited about it.

“I certainly don't think we overly focus on them. We trust the systems we've put in place and practiced.

“We've created habits and muscle memory and all those sorts of bits of blah so we focus more or less on ourselves, knowing their eight, nine, 10 are world class, that (Andre) Esterhuizen is an unbelievable ball carrier, that they've got one of the most dominant scrums in the league.

“You see (Cadan) Murley's break at the weekend in the last five minutes of the Sale game and the speed they've got with him and (Tyrone) Green.

“It (their list of threats) is never-ending.

“And the fact Marcus Smith is up there as one of the best 10s in the world because of the way he sees space and can create and how competitive he is.

“We've got to understand what those threats are but we're not going to spend our whole day worrying about what Quins are going to do because they could do something totally different to what they've done thus far.

“We trust our systems knowing we've got to be alert and ready for anything because they play fast, because they play fast, they see spaces and they're sharp.

“Will Evans turns over ball for fun and when it becomes unstructured play, that's when they come into their own, so turnover ball is dangerous.

“But if I told you breakdown has been a focus for about 53 weeks of the last season then nothing changes on that front really.”

Saints are currently top of the league table.

But Dowson hasn’t taken much notice of league positions with three games to go.

"I haven't thought anything about league positions other than we want to be in the play-offs and a home play-off is better than an away play-off, which we've discovered over the past two years,” he said.

“My big concern this week is Quins, my big concern next week is Europe and then we'll see where we go from there because I imagine my big concern the following week will be Gloucester.”