The Lions will win the second test in Pretoria against Pretoria. As Paul Ackford writes in The Telegraph that's because history dictates that it will be so.
"The first is that Ian McGeechan has never lost the second Test in two tours as a player, and four as a head coach. That record is once more on the line as the Lions build for Pretoria. To lump that kind of pressure on a grey-haired, 62-year-old former school teacher may seem invidious, but Geech is the Lions' best chance. Why? Because the other statistic states that in recent history only once, in 1989 in Australia, have the Lions lost the first Test and won a series. Geech was in charge on that tour, too.
The Lions do not require major surgery. Obviously, it would be madness to include Phil Vickery after his beating yesterday. Even if the Lions have a point and referee Bryce Lawrence did indeed see something amiss in Vickery's scrummaging technique that scores of international officials have missed previously, the psychological advantage Bok prop Tendai 'Beast' Mtawarira will take into the next match will be huge.
So Adam Jones takes Vickery's jersey, and there is a case for starting Matthew Rees alongside him. Rees can be a woefully inaccurate line-out thrower but the Lions scrummage looked strongest when the Welsh front row were in harness and they cannot afford to struggle in that phase again."
RSS feed
