Alasdair Strokosch has vowed to fight fire with fire when England arrive at Murrayfield to compete for the Calcutta Cup on Saturday.

The visitors will start as odds-on favourites to retain the famous silverware but Strokosch insists England's players are "no better" than Frank Hadden's men.

Brian Ashton's side shocked France in Paris in their last outing, on the same day that Scotland slumped to their third heavy defeat in succession, losing to Ireland in Dublin.

But Strokosch believes an upset could be on the cards as long as Scotland can neutralise England's powerful pack.

"They are traditionally strong in the forwards and are very physical, so you've got to take that side of their game away from them," said the 25-year-old.

Strokosch has played in winning teams against England at under-18, under-19, under-21 and 'A' level, and now he wants to complete the set.

"You've got to step up and hit them harder than they can hit you," he said, "so that they struggle to get any sort of momentum going.

"Once we have done that, we are going to have to take the initiative and play a bit of rugby ourselves.

"You don't have five or 10 minutes to get into the game, you've got to be firing from the word go."

The blindside flanker has been playing his club rugby with high-flying Gloucester in the Guinness Premiership this season.

His experiences in England, since moving from Edinburgh last summer, have convinced him Scotland have nothing to fear against Ashton's men.

"It helps playing with and against those guys every week. You see what they are like and you quickly realise that they are not the super-heroes the English media tend to make them out to be. They are no better than us," said the 25-year-old.

"It's just a matter of getting over that mental block and getting stuck into them."

Strokosch made his Six Nations debut against Ireland two weeks ago, in place of injured captain Jason White.

He was one of Scotland's most impressive performers that day, and that has persuaded Hadden to leave his talismanic skipper on the bench so Strokosch can carry on in Edinburgh from where he left off in Dublin.

The player's own thoughts on his performance against Ireland and the areas of his game he hopes to improve against England say a lot about the abrasive style of play he brings to the team.

"I was happy that I got myself into the game," said Strokosch. "I managed to carry the ball a fair bit and make a few tackles, but there was still more I could have done.

"I was a bit slow with a few hits in the scrum, I got my body position wrong with one tackle and ended up missing my man, and I was out of position with another tackle which meant I ended up making a passive tackle rather than a dominant one, so those are all things I can improve."

The karate black belt, who once reached the quarter-final stage of the martial art's Under-21 World Championships, is now firmly focused on his rugby.

"You work throughout the week on the little details so that they become automatic on the day of the game," he said.

"That means that you can get yourself in the right position to make the tackle and when the collision comes that is when the emotion kicks in.

"That's when the desire to hit someone and hurt them takes over from the technique - at the point of contact.

"Last week was quite a big step up for me pace-wise, but physically it was there or thereabouts with the Guinness Premiership.

"Once I got into the game I realised that I was able to live at that level and that gave me a bit of confidence to go forward.

"I was pretty fidgety last Saturday before the game. It was a 5pm kick-off so it was a long day, and you had to keep finding things to do because you can't sit there and keep running the game through your head or you'll go mad.

"My girlfriend was worse than me - she was a wreck when I saw her after the game.

"I'll still be pretty pumped this week, especially because it's England, but it's at home and that should make things easier."

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