Lethargic Lions limp to victory

The British and Irish Lions beat New South Wales (NSW) Country 46-3 today in the finalwarm-up for the first test against Australia…

The British and Irish Lions beat New South Wales (NSW) Country 46-3 today in the finalwarm-up for the first test against Australia.

The Lions' mid-week team scored six unanswered tries to run out comfortable winners against their amateur opponents from the state's rural areas.

England wing Ben Cohen scored two tries while flanker Colin Charvis, centre Scott Gibbs, scrumhalf Austin Healey and prop Dai Young grabbedone each.

Welsh flyhalf Neil Jenkins kicked five conversions and two penalties for a haul of 16 points while Nathan Croft booted a penalty for Country.

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None of the Lions players, with the exception of Martin Corry, enhanced their prospects of being selected in the team to play the Wallabies inBrisbane on Saturday.

Although the Lions had too much power, speed and class for the locals, they struggled for long periods of the game and were heavily penalised byreferee Greg Hinton.

Country exposed some worrying problems in the Lions' defence and forced them to turn over a lot of ball but were unable to capitalise.

It was not until midway through the first half that the Lions finally got their act together as they piled on the six tries in a 25-minute period butfailed to score again in the final 30 minutes.

The match was preceded by a minute's silence in remembrance of Anton Toia, the Lions' baggage handler, who died from a suspected heartattack on Monday.

NSW Country surprised the tourists in the first 20 minutes, dominating possession and showing some clever improvisation.

They held a territorial advantage for most of the first term but were unable to prevent the Lions from scoring when they were in possession.

Jenkins opened the scoring with a penalty in the eighth minute after Croft had missed with two earlier attempts.

Croft finally succeeded with his third shot to level the scores in the 24th minute before the Lions swung into action.

Cohen scored his first try of the tour when he finished off a sweeping backline move in the right-hand corner.

Shortly after, Charvis burst through some weak defence to score next to the posts.

As the Lions threatened to open the floodgates, Gibbs, who only arrived in Australia on Thursday to replace injured England centre Mike Catt,made up for lost time when he backed up to finish off a 60-metre try and Healey darted around from the back of a ruck to score on the stroke ofhalftime.

Jenkins kicked the second penalty shortly after the re-start before mid-week captain Young ploughed his way over from the back of a ruck.

With the Lions' scrum and lineout now well in control, the tourists were able to open up the Country defence on a number of occasions.

But they managed only one more try, a 50-metre sprint by Cohen, for the rest of the match.

Lions' coach Graham Henry was scheduled to name his test team on Wednesday.