Players from all English clubs could miss out on selection for the British & Irish Lions tour to South Africa because of the overlap between the Gallagher Premiership season and the Lions training camp.
It is only three weeks until Warren Gatland, the Lions head coach, announces his squad for the tour to South Africa and there is still no solution. He said yesterday: “I’m just hoping we can get some resolution and common sense will prevail, so we don’t have to go through the squad and start looking at 50-50 calls on players and thinking, ‘Well, he’s based in England so unfortunately he’s not going to be available to us.’ ”
This stand-off may reach some form of resolution, as the English clubs seem to be putting a price on the release of their players. But even if there is an agreement, it is inevitable that some players at English clubs will suffer.
The problem is a diary clash, with the Gallagher Premiership final being arranged for June 26 — the same day that the Lions have a “home” Test match against Japan at Murrayfield, before flying to South Africa.
The argument initially was whether Premiership Rugby Limited (PRL) would move to bring the final forward by a week but it refused, arguing that the Lions game was outside of the international window. This is not a problem only for the English players. Stuart Hogg, the Scotland full back and captain who plays for Exeter Chiefs, would also be unavailable, for example.
Advertisement
The problem for the English-based players is that it is not only the Japan Test that they would be missing, but the two-week preparation camp beforehand too. “The last thing I’d want is for players to miss out on the tour because of [not being available for] that,” Gatland said. However, the stand-off is so extreme that it is not only the clubs in the final, and the semi-finals a week earlier, who are holding back their players. It is all 13 PRL clubs, which includes Saracens.
Saracens are not even in the Premiership this season — they are in the Greene King IPA Championship, the division below — and their players’ club season would have ended. Yet all 13 PRL clubs are standing as one, so players such as Owen Farrell and Maro Itoje would not be released.
“What we are asking for is: can they be released a little bit earlier, when they’ve finished their club campaign?” Gatland said.
The Lions will be lobbying PRL this week to find a solution. However, even with an agreement, there will still be an overlap and some English club players will be unable to attend the Lions prep camp. At Exeter Chiefs, who are likely to reach to the final, borderline players such as Henry Slade and Luke Cowan-Dickie may find that they miss out on Lions selection for this reason.
Gatland also said yesterday that it would be no surprise if some players declared themselves unavailable for the tour because of the strict Covid-19 guidelines that may be required in South Africa. The squad also face the possibility of a quarantine period on their return.
Advertisement
The Lions management will therefore write to all players who are in consideration for selection and ask them to declare their availability, before the squad announcement on May 6.
“I fully understand if players maybe don’t put their hand up to tour so we want to sound them out before we do finally select the squad,” Gatland said.
“The last thing I want to do is pick a squad and then have half a dozen players pull out, but I wouldn’t hold it against any player and I’d understand their personal situation of being away from home, family and the challenges that’s going to bring.”
● South Africa’s highly rated lock Eben Etzebeth will be sidelined for “many weeks” after an operation on a finger injury suffered in training last week, his French club Toulon said yesterday. The 29-year-old has had surgery in the past few days.
