Ellis recently signed a new contract keeping him at London Irish until 2011

London Irish defence coach Dave Ellis says the Exiles' St Patrick Day match against Sale will be a 'thrill'.

Ellis was part of the Grand Slam-winning France coach staff last weekend in Paris, but admitted to BBC Berkshire he was glad to be back with Irish.

He said: "It'll be good coming from Six Nations into one of the biggest crowds of the season at the Madejski Stadium.

"I'm looking forward to working with the players again so we get back on track very quickly."

Ellis watched his France team edge their way to a Grand Slam last weekend, beating England 12-10 at the Stade de France.

But despite the close finish to the game, he insists he was not nervous.

"I was pretty confident because psychologically the group is a lot stronger, even though they're a lot younger than in previous years," he said.

"They'd covered every single scenario during the week and they had the answers to all the questions that England were going to ask."

The Exiles have slipped outside the play-off places in the Premiership during the Six Nations period, and Ellis said they are all well aware how important the next few games are.

"We've now a short run-in, just six games, and we've got to get ourselves back into the top four and pick the momentum up towards the end of the season," he said.

"We'll look at the immediate three games - we have some players who are out injured who'll be coming back after these three, so we'll be really strong for the last month of the season.

"But we've got to make sure we get the job done - we have to make sure we get a win this weekend, which will then give us some momentum for the ones that follow."

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