ED Phillips admits he will consider taking a little longer than usual practicing his kicking tomorrow, but is confident of handling the pressure.

The scrum half and vice captain will continue his role from the tee for Oxfordshire.

Although he is accustomed to kicking under pressure – Phillips has scored 20 points in the last two Oxfordshire Cup finals for Banbury – Twickenham will be a different experience for the 29-year-old.

The half back, who works in advertising at his family’s business Swan Foundry, said: “A few of my mates have said ‘I would not fancy that job’.

“I always say everyone feels pressure and nerves, it’s just how you deal with it.

“It’s just the same as kicking at Banbury in the howling rain on a Tuesday, you just have to put it out of your head, but it’s easier said than done.

“Once you get to Twickenham you can take it all in and process it a bit more and I might give myself longer to practice.

“I find it best when I don’t think about it and keep it as simple as possible.”

Clubmate and fly half Sam Stoop has played at Twickenham before in a curtain-raiser for the Varsity Match in 1995, representing Cambridge RFC against Oxford RFC, aged 12.

But the 34-year-old describes tomorrow’s game as the “real deal” and, with Oxfordshire racking up 61 points across their two pool games, is confident of causing Sussex plenty of problems.

Stoop, who works as a director of sport at Winchester House School in Brackley, said: “We’ve got an exceptionally talented backline.

“There’s some real quality there and I think the issue we’ve had is we only performed for 20 minutes in each of the group matches.

“But if we perform well together for even 50 minutes we would be devastating.

“There are a lot of try-scorers, strong ball carriers and unbelievable pace at full back and on the wings.”