AS a Harlequins player, Scotland winger Tim Visser lives closer to Twickenham than any other member of the national squad. He has won there twice already this season at club level, against Gloucester and Bristol, and says the venue has “been a genuinely good place for me”.

That sets the Dutch-born back apart from most of his team-mates, and it puts him in a good position to assess the mood of the home squad and their supporters ahead of tomorrow’s Calcutta Cup clash, in which he will again wear the No 11 jersey. After nearly two seasons with Quins, he has become accustomed to an atmosphere of confidence and expectation around the west London ground, but this time he gets the feeling there is an element of trepidation there too.

“I think they’re probably pretending to be more confident than they are,” Visser said when asked about the England side. “Speaking to the English public, they think Scotland have a realistic chance, but the players themselves aren’t as cocky as they normally are, which is a good sign.

“But at the end of the day they have the track record. They have the results against us. But they’re not as loud as they normally are.”

England have won their three matches so far in this year’s Six Nations Championship, and are just one game away from equalling the All Blacks’ record of 18 consecutive Test wins. They were embarrassed by their failure to get to grips quickly in their last match with Italy’s innovative tactics at the breakdown, and such a humiliating experience might normally provoke a backlash from a good side in their next outing.

But Visser believes that both the timescale and the fact that England did actually end up on the winning side against the Italians will together mean there will be no desire to set past wrongs right.

“There has been a fallow week in between, so you don’t get that direct response from a team that you’d normally expect,” he reasoned. “They didn’t perform as well as they would have wanted to against Italy, but at the end of the day they got another result, which is all that counts for them. I imagine that there would have been some harsh words from [England head coach] Eddie Jones.”

While England will be out to equal the All Blacks’ record of 18 consecutive Test victories, Scotland have their own history to think about: none of the players were born the last time the team won at Twickenham, way back in 1983. Vern Cotter’s team have already won their opening match in the Championship for the first time since 2006, and beaten Wales for the first time in a decade, and Visser would love to be part of the side that ends that long run without a win in London.

“I’ve been a part of a few smaller victories like that, the one against France last year and the one against Wales a few weeks ago,” he added.”It makes you want to do it again and be part of that team. That’s why I’m so excited to play, because you don’t want to be the guy that isn’t part of a big victory like that.”

The winger played a big part in the win against Wales last time out, overshadowing opposite number George North in what was probably his finest performance to date for Scotland in nearly 30 outings. He has always been a good finisher, but has now added a greater threat in the air – although insisted that aspect of his game would not be any more prominent tomorrow just because, in right-winger Jack Nowell, his direct opponent is notably shorter than the towering North.

“It’s just part of our game plan – we’re not targeting any individual. Big George North is probably the least likely person you’d want to target.”