Tomorrow sees the British and Irish Lions test squad being announced. The last tour was in New Zealand, where I was fortunate enough to be fore the second and third tests. I hope the tests are more competitive this time, but I cannot predict which players will make the squad.
Legends such as Will Greenwood, Keith Wood and Stuart Barnes cannot agree. Is it because they are looking for different things, or that nobody has really set the tour alight so far?
I would pick Jenkins, Mears, Vickery, Shaw, O'Connell, Croft, Williams, Heaslip, Phillips, Jones, Monye, Roberts, O'Driscoll, Bowe and Byrne. Bench will be Sheridan, Rees, Wyn-Jones, Wallace, Ellis, O'Gara and Fitzgerald.
Shaw is streets ahead of the other locks due to his physicality and will not take a backward step against Botha at the front of the lineout. He also has a better handling and open play game. Ieuan Evans writing in today's Telegraph agrees, as an aside, he played with Shaw back on the 1997 tour to South Africa.
Croft I imagine will shade Wallace on the blindside, but this could go either way. Sheridan hasn't done enough, and has had two games in short succession, neither of which have proved he is on form, while Jenkins clearly is.
O'Gara will be on the bench, again I guess this will be a very close call, but there's really no other kicker other than O'Gara.
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