British Lions Betting: Coaches hail O'Connell 'a leader and a winner'

British Lions / Geoffrey Riddle / 21 April 2009 / 1 Comments

As the British Lions' squad is announced, betting.betfair.com's rugby correspondent Geoffrey Riddle asks Ian McGeechan and Warren Gatland the questions that Betfair punters are dying to hear answered...

That's it. The waiting is finally over. The 37 men who are pencilled in for this year's Lions tour were unveiled today in the plush surroundings of a hotel near Terminal 5 in the dulcet tones of Gerald Davies, the Lions tour manager. To see who they are, click here.

The debate over who missed out and why is deathly dull, but the one area of that subject that interests punters greatly is the captaincy. After Ireland's magnificent Grand Slam, it was impossible to conceive that anyone else other than Brian O'Driscoll or Paul O'Connell would lead the Lions on their 13th tour of South Africa. Punters and rugby fans alike had their favourite amongst those two candidates, and O'Driscoll was backed down to as short as [1.25] on Betfair for the honour.

Barring injury, however, it will be O'Connell who leads out the team against the Springboks in Durban on June 20th and coach Ian McGeechan was in no doubt that he had picked the right man. "Paul has proved himself a great leader with Munster and Ireland," the head coach said. "He drives a forward pack. With the character that he is, I believe that we need that focus in the forwards. I feel that we need that impetus up front and Paul is the right character for that."

The other coaches were just as enthusiastic about O'Connell. Warren Gatland, who had a public spat with the Irishman during the Six Nations, was quick to show that he had buried the hatchet with the towering lock. "Paul is a winner. He is hard-nosed and pretty uncompromising. It's not about captains, countries or nations, it about picking the best team."

When the Lions were last in South Africa 12 years ago it was their uncompromising defence that contributed to the fine 2-1 series win, a strategy that may be repeated this time if defence coach Shaun Edwards has anything to do with it.

McGeechan joked that Edwards has insisted on just one day a week to work on attack when the tour begins, but joking aside, the hard-nosed former Leaguie was trenchant in his views on how the Lions must play if they are going to win the summer series. "There is no doubt in my mind we have to win the collisions on the advantage line and through phases two and three," the Wasps and Wales man said.

"They are the best defensive unit in the world at the moment. You can see it in their sense of anticipation and unity.

"They have an excellent scrambled defence. It was easy to see during the November internationals, especially when Bakkies Botha shepherded out Delon Armitage.

"I think it would be unreasonable for us to expect our offence to score five tries in any Test, so it will be up to our defence to keep their points to a minimum if we are going to win."

Punters would be wise therefore to keep in mind that the Tests may turn out to be attritional, low-scoring affairs, something borne out by the fact that eight of the last 12 Tri-Nations fixtures to be played in South Africa have featured fewer than 42.5 points.

The Lions' first three fixtures are at altitude and the final two Tests also take place on the high veld, in Pretoria and Johannesburg. It is common knowledge that to perform at altitude there are only two ways to prepare. The Super 14 teams have long flown in on the day of the match, but the alternative is to acclimatise, a process which can take up to two weeks.

It was revealed by McGeechan that the players not involved in the Heineken Cup final (May23rd), will attend a high-altitude training camp in Grenada, Spain, but there were no plans in place as yet to deal with the altitude problem when the tour begins.

The combination of lack of preparation and the short nature of the modern tour means that this will be one of the toughest tasks facing any touring party in the history of the Lions concept. Betfair punters make the world champion Springboks [1.44] to prevail in the three-Test series, and the visitors [3.25], which, incidentally, is the best price you can get in the British betting market.

When asked whether he thought that the Lions had a better chance of winning the Test series than their current odds suggest, McGeechan shot back the reply. "That goes with the history of the series doesn't it? I think that's about right."

The Lions have in fact won 16 of the 43 Tests they have played on South African soil over the years, losing 21 and drawing six. That represents a strike-rate of 37%, which equates to around a [2.7] shot. Food for thought over the next few weeks, especially with the Springboks looking tired or injured due to their Super 14 commitments.

Comments (1)

1. Dave Byrne | 21 April 2009

   Its British AND IRISH lions