WARREN Gatland believes Wales will cope with sudden great expectations when they head to Twickenham to face Six Nations champions England.

The head coach is well-accustomed to the Welsh sporting psyche after 10 years at the helm and knows that their opening round destruction of Scotland has sent hope soaring after most had a glum feeling at the start of the championship.

Wales made light of their lengthy injury list to record their first Six Nations bonus point try and now head into away trips to favourites England and Ireland looking to put themselves in the title mix with at least one shock win.

Head coach Gatland said: “We will go from one extreme to the other! We go from no expectation against Scotland when we were rubbish and we were getting a lot of ex-Welsh [players] in the media saying that we were going to lose and writing us off to this week the expectations being through the roof.

“We have to deal with that in Wales.”

Gatland said the size of the 34-7 victory against the Scots didn’t surprise him – “we trained really well and I said to the players that I think we will batter them” – but the performance means they head over the Severn Bridge with confidence.

Adding to that belief is the record in London under the head coach that has seen them win in 2008, 2012 and famously in 2015 when England were knocked out of the pool stages of their own World Cup.

“It’s a mouth-watering fixture now because I don’t think people were expecting us as comfortably as we did against Scotland,” said Gatland.

“Hopefully a few people sit up and take a bit of notice and that will make next week even more exciting.

“Since I’ve been involved we haven’t been afraid of going to Twickenham and we have had some good performances and victories, it’s not a place that we are afraid to go to.

“It’s a great ground and if you go there with self-confidence and self-belief then you can get something.”

Wales must now mull over whether to make changes to their matchday 23 with Lions wings George North and Liam Williams in contention after knee and abdominal injuries.

Fly-half Dan Biggar (shoulder) and number eight Taulupe Faletau (knee) are making good progress.