Crusaders v British & Irish Lions, AMI Stadium, Christchurch, Saturday, 7.35pm local time (8.35am Irish time), Live on Sky Sports 1 and our liveblog from 7.30am
The unforgiving nature of the Lions’ tour schedule is already starkly plain. Having suffered a bad case of the Blues on Wednesday, only a week after landing, they moved on to Christchurch in readiness for Saturday’s meeting with the Crusaders, Super Rugby’s unbeaten leaders who are locked and fully loaded with All Blacks for this game.
Whether by accident or design, Warren Gatland has managed to keep back a quartet of proud Lions from the Test-series win of four years ago set to finally make their mark, namely Seán O'Brien, Conor Murray, Jonathan Davies and George North, all of whom were part of that 41-16 win in Sydney four years ago.
In again making 15 changes, and granting the remaining 11 players of his squad their first start of the tour, Gatland’s 23-man squad includes ten players who were also part of the matchday squad four years ago in Sydney, with Alun Wyn Jones again captaining the side.
Then again, they’re facing the cream of the Kiwi crop.
For their part, Crusaders coach Scott Robertson has opted to go into this game locked and fully loaded, with only two changes from the side that dramatically made it 14 wins from 14 this year at home to the Highlanders last Saturday.
One of those is injury enforced, with All Blacks centre Ryan Crotty sidelined with the rib injury he suffered last week after his lines of running and passing had helped the Crusaders make much of the first-half running.
Roaming all-court play
Even this sees the return of another All Black, with recently returned Israel Dagg being promoted from the bench last week to fullback and David Havili switching to midfield. The only other change sees Bryn Hall starting and Mitchell Drummond on the bench as the scrumhalves rotate.
Hence, the Crusaders will start six of the nine players named in the All Blacks squad for their game against Samoa and three-match Test series, the other exception being the injured Kieran Read, who is expected to recover from a broken finger in time for the Tests.
In addition to Dagg, this includes their entire tight five of Joe Moody, Codie Taylor, Owen Franks, Luke Romano and Sam Whitelock, as well as a cluster of gifted young backs and the roaming, all-court play of openside Matt Todd. Another All Black, Wayne Crockett, is part of a bench widely regarded as the best in Super Rugby, and a huge contributor to their unbeaten season so far.
Ironically, the Crusaders may not have the same ball-carrying ballast and X -factor which Sonny Bill Williams, Steven Luatua and co had, nor perhaps even the cutting edge of Reiko Ioane. They also have a tilt at an overdue title to come. But they’ll be better organised. The Lions will not dominate at scrum time, nor with their maul, as they did against Blues, for these Crusaders are better spoilers. Nor will they have as much space to play in, for the Crusaders are also better organised defensively.
Avoidable penalties
So the Lions are going to have to work harder for their points.
However, there’s much they can improve on, not least reducing the concession of eminently avoidable penalties, whilst also taking their chances.
A restorative performance and a win would do wonders for morale, and maybe even generate some respect from a largely dismissive media. It would do the tourists no end of good for a barnstorming display, not least the sight of O’Brien back to his vintage best, carrying hard, making big hits and winning turnovers, albeit like so many of the rusty members of this squad, it looks a big ask.
“Sean hasn’t trained a lot,” admitted Gatland. “He has coming back from injury. We know with a few games under his belt how destructive and potent he can be. The challenge for him is to get two or three games under his belt and in a position where he’s fighting for a Test place. He is keen and excited and I am looking forward to seeing him play.”
“The mix of the backrow looks quite exciting at the moment. We talked about the balance and the lineout option and we know how good Peter O’Mahony is at lineout time. I hope he brings a bit of that Munster mongrel on Saturday night,” said Gatland with a smile.
Stuck in
When this was put to him, O’Mahony guardedly said: “You’re going to have to put that in a better context now, what exactly did he say?
When it was explained that Gatland was looking for what O’Mahony brought to the party, the Munster captain said: “Look, to be successful over here we’re going to have to get stuck in and we’re going to have to be physical. I’m hoping that’s what he meant because as a backrow, I suppose, as a pack, it’s a thing you don’t need talent for. You can put your head down and just work hard and I think that’s going to be a very important part if we’re going to be successful, a huge part.”
As an aside, Gatland gave a relatively positive update on Jared Payne following the recurrence of his calf strain on Wednesday night.
“It was his good calf that tightened up last night. He has got probably the skinniest calves in world rugby. He hasn’t played a lot of rugby, so it was good to get him on the field. He was rusty but showed a couple of nice touches and was a bit unlucky not to have scored that try in the corner. Hopefully he will recover and get some more game time.”
CRUSADERS: I Dagg; S Tamanivalu, J Goodhue, D Havili, G Bridge; R Mo'unga, Bryn Hall; J Moody, C Taylor, O Franks; L Romano, S Whitelock (capt); H Bedwell-Curtis, M Todd, J Taufua.
Replacements: B Funnell, W Crockett, M Alaalatoa, Q Strange, J Brown, M Drummond, M Hunt, T Bateman.
BRITISH & IRISH LIONS: S Hogg (Scot); G North (Wal), J Davies (Wal), B Te'o (Eng), L Williams (Wal); O Farrell (Eng), C Murray (Ire); M Vunipola (Eng), J George (Eng), T Furlong (Ire); A-W Jones (Wal, capt), G Kruis (Eng); P O'Mahony (Ire), S O'Brien (Ire), T Faletau (Wal).
Replacements: K Owens (Wal), J McGrath (Ire) D Cole (Eng), M Itoje (Eng), CJ Stander (Ire), R Webb (Wal), J Sexton (Ire), A Watson (Eng).
Referee: M Raynal (France).
Lions record v Canterbury selections: Played 14, Won 10, D O, L 4.
Betting (Paddy Power): 8/11 Crusaders, 20/1 Draw, 6/5. Handicap odds (Lions +2pts), 10/11 Crusaders, 19/1 Draw, 10/11 Lions.
Forecast: Crusaders to win.
