Gatland: We have poked the bear

WARREN GATLAND is convinced his Lions can go on to claim an historic series triumph despite admitting they have ‘poked the bear’ by beating the All Blacks in Wellington. Gatland is expecting a furious backlash from the All Blacks, who will be without Sonny Bill Williams after he was banned for four weeks yesterday for his red card on Saturday. ‘Yes, we have poked the bear, but hopefully the wounded Lion from last week is still recovering as well,’ said Gatland. ‘This was massive for all of us and for everything, for the future of the Lions, for the team, for the people involved. ‘To go 1-1 with nobody expecting that and to show the character we did — we can go to Eden Park thinking, “Actually, if we play to our ability we are capable of winning the series”.’ Gatland is adamant his team can raise their game for the grand finale. ‘There were a lot of things (in the second Test) I wasn’t happy about,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t happy about some of the penalties and the discipline. ‘We’ve got to make sure we don’t give away soft penalties. That needs to improve and our kicking game needs to be more accurate. The ironic thing is that New Zealand are the best team in the world, but for two matches they haven’t stressed us. They have squeezed us, made us give away penalties and that has been to our downfall, but we haven’t seen the expansive rugby that the All Blacks are known for, creating havoc. ‘We’ve coped with that and if we can continue to cope with that and improve in other areas, then we are going to see, hopefully, a great Test match.’