I was hurt by O’brien criticism, says Gatland

Warren Gatland has revealed he was “hurt” by Sean O’brien’s criticism of the British and Irish Lions’ New Zealand tour.

Ireland flanker O’brien, a pivotal Lions figure during a pulsating drawn threetest series against the All Blacks, claimed in a podcast interview last month that the squad had been over-trained during Test match preparations.

O’brien believes the Lions could have won the series 3-0, and he also aimed verbal fire at Lions assistant coach Rob Howley, who had responsibility for their attacking game, saying he struggled to get his message across and that Johnny Sexton and Owen Farrell “drove everything” in attack during second Test week.

Gatland reacted to O’brien for the first time yesterday, saying: “I was disappointed. I have to be honest – It took a bit of the gloss off the Lions tour.

“I went, ‘Phew!’ If he wanted to say something, then there is a different forum rather than being critical. No-one has ever, in the history of the game, taken on a tour of that magnitude or difficulty.

“Did we learn as coaches from that experience? Would we have done some things differently? Of course we would. That’s part of coaching, part of the experience. If he was going to make some comments, then he could have done so in a different way.

“You watch how hard the coaches and the backroom staff worked – they worked their absolute b ***** s off on that tour – and then to have someone come out and make a comment like that... it really, really did hurt.”

The head coach revealed he rang O’brien to express his disappointment, adding that the player texted him saying he had been taken out of context. “I texted to say he could call me at any time, but I’ve not heard back from him,” Gatland added.

“Thedisappointingthing, I thought Sean’s comments were disrespectful to New Zealand, saying that we should have comfortably won the series 3-0. I don’t know what planet he is on.”