Standing in their way tomorrow will be a Scotland team under the guidance of former Ireland defence coach Graham Steadman and ex-Leinster forwards guru Mike Brewer.

The pair became involved in Frank Hadden’s set-up at the start of the season after spells on the other side of the Irish sea.

Steadman spent three years with Ireland and two with Munster before that, while Brewer was with Leinster for three.

Kidney believes his players will have to be totally switched on tomorrow because Brewer and Steadman will be prepared to use every trick in the book to get the right result for their new employers.

“It is one of those variables we understand but we can’t do anything about because we don’t have any control over it,” said Kidney.

“It’s the nature of professionalism. They have been great servants to Irish rugby in their own way – Mike to Leinster and Steady to Ireland and Munster - but the other side of that coin is that it gives them a lot of information to build up on our lads.

“So they’ll have done their one-on-ones, they’ll know what makes us tick, and I’m sure they’ll have a plan in place to counteract us.

“I don’t think you can overestimate how important that information is to them as regards to cutting down space for us.

“How are we going to firstly get hold of the ball, then hold onto it long enough to be able to break them down?

“We’ll just have to deal with it on the day. We are going to have to be sharp because we are going to have to play very smart to get some scores against them, as well as having our defence being right up there.”

Kidney believes pre-match analysis is crucial in the modern international game but only in terms of ensuring teams start games on a level playing field.

“You can do so much analysis, but then each side has the same information on one another, so it is then about who adapts best to the conditions on the day and to what is put in front of them by the opposition,” he said.

Ireland may be going for the Grand Slam, while Scotland are struggling at the other end of the Six Nations table, but Kidney was keen to play down the favourites tag ahead of this weekend’s clash.

He said: “It was only a couple of months ago that there was only something like 0.26 difference in the IRB ranking, and a few of our kicks went over against Argentina while a few of theirs went wide against South Africa, and that’s the only difference really between the two sides.

“I think what happened in round one was that there was a sin-bin and Wales scored a lot of points at that time, and that’s probably when the game got away from Scotland.

“Other than that, there has been nothing in it for the last number of matches.”