The East Midlands rivals meet at Twickenham in front of an 82,000 sell-out crowd on the final day of an enthralling domestic season.
Making his final preparations for the showpiece occasion, Tigers director of rugby Cockerill said: “There is an obvious local rivalry and when you look at the quality of players on both sides it should be a great contest.
“Sometimes in the season you have to remind guys who they are playing against but that isn’t the case this week. We know each other very well, the players know each other from England camps and from playing against each other regularly in big games.
“We’ve got a lot of respect for Saints, we appreciate what they bring to the game. They are a big, physical team and they have some big threats. They got a very good result in the semi-final, they upset Saracens’ rhythm, got under their skins, and when they got a couple of scores it made them very hard to beat from there.
“At lineout and scrums there are two sets of good players who are well coached and it will be a good contest.”
Tigers are making a ninth successive trip to the Premiership Final but looking for a first league title since 2010 after losing to Saracens and Harlequins the last two years.
“The last few Finals have been very disappointing for us, falling at the final hurdle,” added Cockerill.
“It is a very special game because it is the Premiership Final. We have a very good squad of players who have all worked extremely hard to get us this far.
“We expect Saints to come out mad for the battle. I’m sure our boys will be pretty mad for the battle too.”
