Ireland wing Andrew Trimble has paid tribute to former Lions skipper Paul O’Connell’s leadership.
Trimble revealed the lock's speech helped inspire Ireland to their destructive RBS 6 Nations victory which put an end to English hopes of a Grand Slam.
"Paul is massively motivated and that inspiration filtered through to the rest of the team," said Trimble.
"We wanted to get everything right technically, but we also wanted to get our physicality, our intensity, everything, right, just a real hatred.
"We were unbelievably motivated to stop them winning the Grand Slam."
Ireland hit top gear against England, for the first time in a frustrating Championship, and Trimble reckons it was part due to the rousing call to arms from the 2009 Lions captain.
"I always love listening to O'Connell during England week," added Trimble.
"He's always got something special to say and it always has the desired effect.
"I knew it was coming – I was thinking 'he's going to say something class' and he did. He never lets you down during an England week.
"I can't give too much away about exactly what he said and I'd be paraphrasing so I couldn't do him justice. It was very inspirational though.
"Everybody's massively motivated against England – we never get sick of beating them and that's why we enjoyed the win so much.
"There's a lot of history there and everyone in the team wants to beat them. Every team wants to beat England and we're no exception."
