In his latest BBC Wales Sport column, Liam Williams discusses playing England in Cardiff without fans, his old Saracens team-mates and the skills of centurion George North, on and off the field.

It has been strange and not ideal but we recognise it is essential because of the situation we are living in at the moment.

But it will be especially weird this weekend when Wales face England in a Six Nations match in Cardiff and there will be nobody in the stands watching.

Games against the old enemy are always great occasions to be involved in and I am not sure if it is going to be the same with it not being played in front of 75,000 fans.

Playing at the Principality Stadium in front of a capacity crowd is always special but there is always something that little bit extra against England. That is true I assume for the fans as well, but definitely for players.

The motivation will be there from us as you would expect and we will be hoping to deliver a victory for the passionate Welsh fans watching at home on television.

It has been a positive start for us so far with two wins in two games. The Triple Crown is up for grabs but that is not something we are looking towards, our focus is to win a Test match.

We have not clicked totally yet but have come away with the victories. That is all that matters in international rugby.

We have some experienced players like George North, Jonathan Davies, Josh Navidi and Josh Adams coming back for boys who have performed well in the last couple of games and that experience and quality will help us.

Boy George... He's fab-brew-lous

George was with the Scarlets when I first joined there so I have known him a long time. Here was this big young monster of a winger and I also just remember in training him sporting his tight curly hairstyle.

He is a proper man child. He loves playing pranks and has his own unique sense of humour, shall we say. He is a great bloke to be around, especially when he is making the coffee with latte art skills.

Never mind Grand Slams, Lions series victories or 100 caps... you can add best coffee maker in the squad to all those accolades. That's a very important accolade as well!

Reaching 100 caps is an incredible achievement at the age of 28 for George and there is more to come from him. He is a special rugby player and it does not matter where he plays, either centre or wing, he will do a job for us.

Victory will be good to mark and celebrate the birthday weekend of Wyn Jones, who is 29 on Friday.

With George switching to the midfield we also have Louis Rees-Zammit on the wing and he announced himself to the rugby world in spectacular style with his two-try display against Scotland.

We knew what he was capable of. He has those moments of brilliance in him and has so much gas and the skills to go with it.

You can see him moving on and maturing as a player on the pitch. Maybe not off the pitch, but he is still only 20 and there is still time to work on that! Seriously though, he is a great guy to be around.

He actually gave me a try-scoring pass against Scotland, but he did his best to throw me a pie with the ball going behind me and I managed just to keep hold of the ball.

I did have a word with him after the game because I had stuck one on a plate for him in the first-half in the corner at Murrayfield.

As full-back, my job this weekend is to be that link between the centres and the wings and give Louis and Josh Adams the time and space to finish, because they can be deadly.

Seeing as I am getting on and losing a yard of pace I am happy to take on that role! It is just nice to be back at 15 because that is my preferred position.

Josh's return has gone under the radar a little bit this week with George's 100 caps and the emergence of Louis - and that will suit him just fine after what happened with his two-match suspension for a Covid-19 breach.

He has just been getting on with his work and I am sure he will do a focused job this weekend. Remember this guy was the top try scorer at the 2019 World Cup in Japan.

England expects

It is always special playing against England and for me it means playing against friends and former team-mates from Saracens.

They form the spine of the England side with Elliot Daly, Owen Farrell, Jamie George, Maro Itoje and the Vunipola brothers.

They have only played a few games this season because Saracens have not been involved in Premiership matches and there is a perception they are rusty.

But we are expecting nothing less than the best version of England and those six players are world class.

Owen will not listen too much to any outside criticism. He is a strong-minded bloke, a world-class player and that is what we are expecting again.

I have played with him for Saracens and the Lions and he is a born leader who inspires from the front and that will be no different on the weekend.

He will be pumped up for this game. But so will we and we hope to be able to deliver that victory for the Wales fans.

We know the supporters will be there in spirit and we saw the evidence of that in our final training session at the Principality Stadium on Friday.

There were 250 jerseys to commemorate the different aspects of Welsh rugby including shirts to mark each of the players in the team.

My Waunarlwydd jersey was there and that made me proud.

So we all know what and who we will be playing for this weekend.