After the war of words in public between the two head coaches came an entente cordiale - or at any rate a truce - whether uneasy only time will tell. In any event, Steve Hansen has extended an olive branch to Warren Gatland.
The All Blacks head coach had clearly braced himself to be questioned about the New Zealand Herald portraying Gatland as a clown, and disapproved of it as well as underlining his respect for his Kiwi rival.
Asked what he had made of the fuss between himself and Gatland, he said: “You are alluding to the cartoon? You may as well go straight at it. It makes it easier to answer the question.
“I think it is really disappointing,” he continued. “It’s one thing to have a bit of banter, and then you guys beef it up to make it bigger than it really is. Like, I have heard you say that I don’t like him, and we won’t have a beer. I have got a lot of respect for him. I think he is a good coach. I have got a lot of respect for the Lions, they are a good team.
“But to come out and do that, I think you are ridiculing somebody that doesn’t deserve it. At the end of the day, we are all coaches trying to do what we think is right. Sometimes people don’t always agree with what we do, but that’s okay, you are allowed to have your opinion.
“But to ridicule someone is not right. It’s a bit disappointing, really.”
Sharing a beer
Masterfully at ease in front of the media glare as usual, when he returned to the subject later in his press conference, Hansen said: “I read somewhere where I lashed out at Warren Gatland. I haven’t lashed out at Warren Gatland at all. I have got a lot of respect for him. I am looking forward to having a beer with him and a chuckle about life.
“We’ve got a lot of common interests. He likes racing horses, so do I, he coaches Wales - I’ve been through that experience myself. It’s the media that ramp it up because it sells you guys newspapers. Who am I to say stop it? But I do look at it and think that’s not actually how it went.”
Hansen also steered away attempts by the home media to raise examples of foul play by Lions’ players in last Saturday’s first Test and in the draw with the Hurricanes, specifically highlighting Iain Henderson’s tip tackle on Jordie Barrett as accidental and worthy of no more than a yellow card.
“What happens on the park, there is a guy who is connected to the ref, and they are doing a pretty good job of making the game a lot cleaner than it was in yester-year, and we’ve got citing commissioners now. If they don’t see it, just move on.
"It's a hard game we play, and there are going to be times when people unintentionally step over the line and do something they might regret later. You only have to look at what happened in the game on Tuesday night with Iain Henderson. It was very reminiscent of what happened to Brian O'Driscoll.
“I am just pleased he just got a yellow card and nothing else, because he didn’t do it intentionally. But in the heat of the moment, his skills at the breakdown to clean him out have not been right, so he’s paid the price with 10 minutes in the bin. Move on from it. I don’t know any rugby players that we’ve played against or I’ve coached that intentionally go out there to hurt anyone.”
Big boys
“Rugby is a big boys’ game, played by big boys and people with character. There are a lot of things that happen in the heat of the moment, and they are definitely not intentional.”
However, what Hansen really wanted to talk about was the prospect of their second meeting with the Lions, all the more so after the quality of the first one.
“At the end of the day, it is about two teams playing a Test match. The last Test was a beauty, and with a little bit more luck and finish, they could have easily won the Test match. They know that, and they will be coming here with a do-or-die attitude. We have got to front up on Saturday. It’s okay doing it once, we have got to do it again. It’s going to be real hands to the pump, so to speak, and everyone is going to have to step up, and if we don’t step up, we will get second.”
He said the big thing the Lions will look to change is their competitiveness at the breakdown. “I think they went in there with a mindset that ‘we’ll only put one person in and we’ll have everyone else on their feet,’ so that they could get their line speed. So that will force some thinking in their camp, and this is why coaches love coaching and players love playing, because it’s cut and thrust. What are they going to do, and what are we going to do in response? It’s about reacting and adapting to that too in the moment.”
Hansen is bracing himself for a Lions backlash, akin to what the All Blacks produced on their revenge mission against Ireland in the Aviva Stadium last November.
“We’re determined to win, and I’m that’s the mental state they’re in. They’ll be determined to win, and they’ve said that already. You wouldn’t expect anything else from them, because quality teams don’t lie down. They stand up and they get counted. Losing hurts.
“It sucks. It’s not a great idea, and it comes with a lot of pain, so you don’t want to do it, especially when you are a quality team, because you are not used to it, and you don’t want it. I think they will come with everything they’ve got, and we need to be prepared for that and bring everything we’ve got to match it.”
