Is this fair on the Lions coach?
A New Zealand paper called, The New Zealand Herald, has portrayed British and Irish Lions coach, Warren Gatland, as a cartoon clown in its paper.
His appearance in the paper as a clown comes after Gatland claimed that the All Blacks had illegally targeted scrum-half, Conor Murray’s, standing leg when he was box-kicking in the Lions’ first test on Saturday where they went down 30-15.
The caricature is pictured alongside an article which is written by the paper’s sports writer, Gregor Paul, whose headline reads “Calling All Blacks dirty will haunt them.”
Today's NZ Herald is… quite something pic.twitter.com/7RybpBm1ie
— Rúaidhrà O'Connor (@RuaidhriOC) June 27, 2017
This is the paper’s third time giving the clown treatment to a head coach in recent months, the first came back in October when the paper mocked Australia boss, Michael Chieka when the two sides met in Auckland.
At the time, Gatland admitted he was “embarrassed” to see a fellow Kiwi being mocked up a clown in the paper, only to end up getting the same treatment himself.
The Herald’s second clown caricature will not sit well with the many who have travelled to support the Lions in New Zealand and according to the article, the status of Gatland is not going to change in New Zealand any time soon.
“The Lions could win their last three games and even then he won’t be able to win everyone back. He might be about to learn the hard way that the end does not always justify the means,” the journalist said.
He concluded that: “Pressure is squeezing him into making bad decisions and perhaps when the dust from this series settles, and he looks back, he’ll agree that it was dumb and reckless to say what he did.”
