Gatland clears air with O’Brien over Lions row

SEAN O’Brien and Warren Gatland have finally held clear-the-air talks over a radio interview which caused a storm in the wake of the Lions tour of New Zealand.

Ireland flanker O’Brien, who started all three Tests of the drawn series with the back-to-back World Cup holders, had controversially criticised the tourists’ management.

He maintained the squad had been over-trained and went into the opening Test, which they lost, fatigued, and also claimed play-makers Johnny Sexton and Owen Farrell had taken ownership of the backs from attack coach Rob Howley ahead of the second rubber.

Gatland revealed on Monday he had tried, but failed to contact O’Brien last week and had sent him a text saying he was “more than welcome” to ring at any time.

And O’Brien did, within a matter of hours, telling Gatland: “I said what I said to try and make things better going forward.

“The conversation went very well and it was very relaxed. I said exactly what I said and he had no problem with it either.

“He obviously said that he was a little bit disappointed that it could have been dealt with in a different way but, I explained my situation and I explained as well about the amount of positives I had mentioned in that whole interview but, it wasn’t portrayed that way.”

O’Brien, speaking at the One Zero conference in Dublin, added: “It’s put to bed. There’s not much more really left to say on it.

“I said: ‘I’ll see ya (Gatland) in a couple of months for a pint.’”

Gatland yesterday told New Zealand’s Radio Sport Breakfast show he didn’t think the Lions had over-trained but agreed parts of the schedule were too demanding.

“Sean O’Brien wasn’t critical of myself. He made a couple of points in terms of he felt we over-trained in the first week,” said the returning Wales coach.

“I’ve looked back on that, we didn’t over-train but I’m disappointed in myself,” admitted Gatland.

“We were a bit heavy legged for that first week. I look back and was it a combination of arriving in New Zealand on a Wednesday, playing a game three days later on the Saturday where we’re struggling with jet-lag the first week or so?

“We didn’t have any days off before the first Test, apart from travel days.

“We’d been in 10 hotels in two weeks... yeah we probably were pretty heavy legged as a result of that.

“I was more disappointed with myself and I mentioned that after the second Test.”