ENGLAND coach Jon Callard has called on his players to ignite the atmosphere this evening as international rugby arrives in Darlington.

The Under-20s play the first game in a double header at the Northern Echo Arena, opening the proceedings against Scotland before World Cup winners England Women take on the Auld Enemy, both fixtures forming part of the RBS 6Nations.

With a large crowd expected at the home of Darlington Mowden Park, Callard feels his side are responsible for delivering a spectacle to fit the attendance.

“I’ve had a good look around the ground, it’s fabulous,” said Callard. “For a National One side it’s fabulous. It’s a wonderful arena, we need to get our heads on and put a good performance in.

“I’m a great believer that as a player you get yourself up for the game. You don’t need to look around and see if there’s a crowd there.

“It’s you against the opposition and you’ve got to raise yourself every time. Some of these players will go to Wellington to face an All Blacks side, Sydney to play Australia, Durban to play South Africa, and the England fans won’t be there, certainly not as much as the opposition.

“So you’ve got to get yourself up for the game. I hope the crowd will come but it takes two to tango, hopefully we can ignite the crowd as well.

“I’m looking forward to it. I’m looking at it being a good night of rugby for those who probably might not come on a regular basis. Hopefully we can make it exciting for them.”

Mowden Park officials are expecting the attendance to be the biggest since they took over the stewardship of The Northern Echo Arena in 2013, and, for England’s under-20s, it will be the biggest crowd so far in the series so far.

After a 21-15 opening defeat in Wales, England recovered to see off Italy 61-0 before edging past Ireland in Donnybrook a fortnight ago, winning 19-14.

Success in the tournament is very much in England’s hands, but Callard is careful not to focus on results.

“It’s all to play for. We don’t talk about outcomes, we talk about our process as a team,” said the former Bath full-back, who was capped five times for England.

“We try to evolve as a team through the year. We didn’t start the year well against Wales but we learned a lot from that. Defeats can hurt but you can learn a lot from it. We had a resurgence, we played well against Italy and a good win against Ireland, where we showed a lot of passion and dug in.

“Hopefully we can build on that. We’re really looking forward to playing at Darlington, it’s a fabulous stadium and hopefully we can get a nice big crowd. It’s a double header so it should be a nice evening of rugby.

“We’ve got to take care of business ourselves, just get our processes right and the outcome should take care of itself.”

Callard stressed the importance of getting the processes right with the current crop of players, with their pathway to the senior squad set in stone should they maintain their expected level of performance, and for England, tonight is important.

The coach added: “It’s statistically proven that this age group has provided 85% of future internationals. It’s only recently the likes of George Ford and Owen Farrell were in this age group. It’s only a matter of a few years ago.

“It has proven itself that the U20s is a good breeding ground, now it’s a case of us getting our processes better in order for those players to be better at the senior end.

“It’s great coming to places like this because these people don’t often get the chance to see international rugby. It’s important that we come and embrace the community and hopefully give them something to make the sport flourish in this area.”