Gatland and his men earn huge respect after epic series draw
Coach clowns around with critics after leading Lions to shock series draw
WARREN GATLAND last night devilishly saw the funny side of the Lions’ series-drawing French farce, arriving into his press conference wearing a clown nose and eyeing down the New Zealand critics who maliciously poked fun at him all tour.
In the wake of Steve Hansen ringing up a radio show and calling him ‘desperate’ two days after the Lions had lost the opening Test 15-30 at Eden Park, the New Zealand Herald depicted Gatland as a cartoon clown.
However, the former Ireland coach has now had the last laugh, following up last weekend’s series-levelling 24-21 win in Wellington with a 15-15 draw in Auckland to leave the series ending in a one-all tie that was a world away from the widely anticipated 3-0 whitewash.
‘It was my idea,’ he said about wearing the comic nose at the end of a 10-match, 39-night trip. ‘I had it last week but I didn’t think it was right time to wear it,’ he chuckled.
Gatland could well laugh, his Lions had royally gotten away with it in Auckland following a dramatic finish that saw France referee Romain Poite incredibly reverse a decision to award New Zealand a kickable 78th-minute penalty following the restart after Owen Farrell had just levelled the score at 15-15.
Rather than permit the All Blacks to have
their shot to win, the official, at the behest of Lions skipper Sam Warburton, reviewed the footage with his TMO and opted to only give the hosts a scrum despite it appearing that sub Ken Owens played the ball from an offside position following a Liam Williams aerial fumble.
The Lions boss claimed the incident should have been a penalty to his side as Kieran Read interfered with Williams in the air.
‘I thought it was a penalty to us, that Kieran Read jumped in and hit the player in the air. We would have been devastated if we had have lost the game from that,’ countered Gatland, who added his preference was for extra-time to decide the series rather than have a first tie since a two-all split with South Africa in 1955. However, he added: ‘We will wake up Sunday and realise it [a tie series] is not a bad place to be.’
Gatland admitted he would relish a rematch with New Zealand at Twickenham in November.
The Barbarians are slated to face the All Blacks at Twickenham on November 4 and Gatland admitted the Lions would fancy stepping in instead to take on New Zealand in an unofficial fourth Test.
‘That would be good wouldn’t it? You’ll have to ask PRL (Premiership Rugby Limited) if they’d release any of the players,’ he said.
Meanwhile, Jonathan Davies admitted he was ‘chuffed to bits’ to be named Lions players’ player of the tour.
The Wales centre excelled once again yesterday.
A try-saving tackle, two thunderous hits on fullback Jordie Barrett and a clutch of threatening half-breaks punctuated just the latest stellar turn from the Scarlets’ slingshot centre.
Davies, a star of the 2013 series win over Australia, played in all three Tests just as he had four years ago, and admitted he loved every second of this tour.
‘I’m very humbled and chuffed to bits to get an award which is voted for by your peers,’ said Davies, of his award.
‘But when you look back it’s been a team effort with 40-odd players and we dug in.
‘We achieved something very special and I’m chuffed.’