Harlequins No.8 James Chisholm is relishing the ‘challenge’ of facing Gloucester as Paul Gustard’s side look to end the season on a high. 

With three games remaining in the regular Premiership season Quins sit sixth, but are 14 points off a top four place, and a semi-final spot looks unlikely so all hopes are turning to finishing strongly ahead of the next campaign. 

Their first assignment on that mission sees a trip to Kingsholm on Monday night – with Chisholm quietly confident the visitors can claim the victory having narrowly won the reverse fixture earlier this season. 

“They’ve got some handy guys,” Chisholm said. “They’ve mixed up their teams quite a bit which they’ve had to do. 

“You see the likes of Garvey going there, I’m really impressed with Jordy Reid who I think played at Ealing last year. 

“They’ve got a really good pack, they’ve got some big lumps, some big ball carriers but they like to play rugby. 

“With the physical side of it, we’ve got to be switched on defensively that they’re going to chuck it about – hopefully it’ll be a good brand of rugby on Monday. 

“I like playing there, we always play fairly well there. It’ll be a good challenge, I’m looking forward to it.” 

If they are to secure a ninth league victory of the campaign though, it is safe to assume Gustard’s men will have to perform better than they did last time out. 

Despite a second half revival, Quins fell 15-10 behind to a young London Irish side and Chisholm was one of several players involved in a frank discussion in the dressing room at half-time. 

He added: “In the first half they kind of shocked us. To tell the truth we looked at the team, really young team, inexperienced. 

“We knew it would be scrappy and they’d be hungry for it and they shocked us a little bit but we addressed a few things at half-time. 

“I was getting quite frustrated, it felt like we were getting bullied by a younger and smaller pack and I thought we needed to address that.”