WARREN GATLAND believes the British and Irish Lions could be “familiar” with the haka by the start of the Test series against the All Blacks.
Head coach Gatland feels the Lions could benefit from the haka becoming “regular preparation”, with the tourists facing the traditional Maori challenge outside of Test matches for the first time.
Super Rugby outfits the Blues, Crusaders and Chiefs will perform it in the build-up to their Lions clashes – and Gatland hinted that could dent the mystique of the famed challenge.
“There’s no plan for the haka; we’ll just face up to it,” said Gatland, with the Lions to face it for the first time this tour against the Blues on Wednesday.
“The nice thing is that players are going to get an opportunity to face the haka on more than one occasion.
“For me the experience, the more times you face up to it, you don’t mind it, it’s a motivational thing; it’s not intimidating. And I’m pleased my players will face it more than once. You become familiar with it. It becomes part of regular preparation for a game.”
Tour captain Sam Warburton will skipper the Lions in Saturday’s opener against the New Zealand Provincial Barbarians in Whangarei.
Lions boss Gatland’s son Bryn will face the tourists in Barbarians colours, in a direct confrontation with Ireland fly-half Johnny Sexton.
Midweek matches on previous Lions tours have been littered with overzealous stars sometimes overstepping the boundaries of acceptable physicality in bidding to make a name for themselves.
The spectre of the double tackle from Tana Umaga and Keven Mealamu on Brian O’Driscoll that ended the Irish centre’s tour in 2005 still looms large over the All Blacks and Lions.
Former New Zealand hooker Mealamu even recently admitted he “still feels a stink” about that tip-tackle, though all associated with New Zealand insist the challenge and resulting injury were both accidents.
The All Blacks held nothing back in a bruising encounter with Ireland in Dublin in November, as they hit back from their first-ever defeat to Joe Schmidt’s men in Chicago just a week earlier.
Robbie Henshaw was carted off after a head-high shot from Sam Cane in that 21-9 loss as the All Blacks atoned for the 40-29 defeat to Ireland in the USA.
The likes of Henshaw and Sexton could come in for some rough-housing across the course of a punishing tour - but Gatland insists he does not expect any of the Lions’ opponents to overstep the mark.
“It’s not something that’s crossed my mind at all: in my experience of New Zealand teams, they play to the limit, they play to the edge but I don’t think they go out there with the purpose of trying to injure players or trying to injure people,” said Gatland.
“We know it’s going to be tough, it’s going to be physical, but at no stage do I think these games will go over the top in terms of physicality from both sides.
“We want it to be tough, but we want some good, clean, hard rugby.
“And I’m confident that all the teams we come up against will go in there with hopefully the same attitude of playing some good rugby on the field, and some entertaining rugby as well.”
Gatland insisted Saturday’s tour-opening XV effectively selected itself, permed from the players who have contributed to every training camp so far. Those who missed the early stages of training due to club commitments are still being phased in and brought up to speed.
Gatland remains intent on handing every player on tour the chance to state their case for Test selection, with the first clash against the All Blacks slated for June 24 at Auckland’s Eden Park.
However, the Wales coach also conceded he intends to have a fair idea of his starting XV for that first Test by the time the Lions face the New Zealand Maori on June 17 – giving the touring squad four matches to prove their point.
“The Maori game is important for us,” said Gatland. “You might be reasonably close to knowing the first Test starting XV by then. It’s a little down the track as well.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here