NFC Championship Game - Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ Green Bay Packers

• Sunday 20:05 GMT on Sky Sports NFL
• Match odds:

Two of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history going head-to-head in an NFC title game at Lambeau Field? Count me in.

In years gone by, this clash between the Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady would almost certainly be the later game in the Championship Sunday window, but 2021 feels like a passing of the torch moment, with the younger duo of Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes taking centre stage in the primetime slot.

This works well for us in the UK though, as it means the kick-off time in Green Bay is extremely palatable, giving Monday morning workers the chance to watch the entirety of this blockbuster battle in the frozen tundra.

It’s impossible to analyse this match-up without first referencing the regular season meeting between these two sides in week six. How much we can truly take from a game that took place in mid-October is up for debate, but it would be amiss to not discuss what happened at Raymond James Stadium that day.

There’s no doubt that it was Green Bay’s lowest point of the season.

The Packers actually started the game on the front foot and picked up a 10-point lead in the first quarter, but from there, the ceiling fell down around Matt LaFleur’s team.

Tampa Bay – who were actually coming off a very disappointing primetime loss to Chicago at the time – came back at the Packers with a vengeance, scoring an incredible 38 unanswered points in what became one of the blowouts of the season.

The most interesting thing to take away from that particular game, in my opinion, was the performance of Tampa Bay’s secondary.

That unit has been much maligned this season, and even I have regularly referenced it as the Bucs’ Achilles heel in this very column. However, in this one game at least, Tampa Bay’s cornerbacks shined.

Carlton Davis had a big hand in holding Davante Adams to 61 yards on the day – which is about as well as anyone has done all season – and Tampa were able to pick off Rodgers twice over the course of the 60 minutes. Two-interception games for Rodgers are akin to flying pigs, and even more shocking was the fact that Jamel Dean returned the first of those interceptions to the end zone – just the third pick-six of Rodgers’ long and ridiculously efficient career.

Going into Sunday’s title game, pundits will be keen to factor in the gusty wind that was blowing in Tampa Bay that afternoon, and the fact that Rodgers began exceeding even his own lofty standards in the second half of the season – performances that have him firmly in the driving seat to collect his third NFL MVP award in a fortnight’s time.

All of this is true, but week six should still provide the Bucs’ secondary with some much-needed hope that they can provide adequate opposition to the Packers’ explosive offensive arsenal on Sunday.

It is vital that Tampa Bay channel that performance, and use the confidence they will have gained from dominating (an admittedly retiring) Drew Brees in the Superdome last week. The only way the Buccaneers can beat the Packers at Lambeau is by taking the ball out of Rodgers’ hands as much as possible.