Hope Shane Williams is keeping his phone charged.
Back in 2013, Warren Gatland called the retired Wales winger up and asked him if he fancied joining the Lions squad. He joined up with te squad and featured in warm-up fixtures but not in the Test Series.
Thus far, James Haskell and Greig Laidlaw have been the only new additions and the Lions have not yet replaced injured fullback Stuart Hogg.
All that could be about to chance, at least according to All Blacks head coach Steve Hansen. The Kiwi suspects Gatland is about to strengthen his squad after this weekend’s Lions game and full slate of international rugby fixtures.
After naming his New Zealand squad to face Samoa at Eden Park, Hansen told reporters he could see the Lions breaking into two squads for the final five tour games [two midweeks and three Test matches]. He commented:
“There is definitely a difference between the two squads in the way they are performing.
“I think Gatland is about to bring a few extra players out to give himself the ability to play two squads. He’s at the stage where he wants to do that. I guess he will bring them out from the UK.”
There is a certain logic to Hansen’s claim.
The Lions will need a full week of training ground prep to get themselves in gear for the First Test, on Saturday. The next midweek game is on Tuesday against the Chiefs and would require 23 of the 40 remaining squad members to gear up. Calling up an extra couple of bodies, especially if they are close by, would certainly help.
Looking at the Lions squad, and who we expect to feature in the Test squad, they could do with an additional hooker, second row and fullback/winger to give the men likely to face the All Blacks some respite.
Despite Hansen claiming reinforcements could arrive from the United Kingdom [we are presuming Ireland is lumped in on this], one suspects any cavalry will be called from the nations playing nearest New Zealand.
England are -14 hours time difference away in Argentina. Scotland are just an hours’ time difference away in Australia and Ireland are three hours and one flight back, in Japan.
Wales? They happen to have a full squad in New Zealand and are playing Tonga this weekend.
As much as there may be hopes for the likes of Mike Brown, Simon Zebo, Dylan Hartley, Keith Earls or Joe Launchbury to get a call, we would not be surprised if the likes of Gareth Anscombe, Jamie Roberts, Tomas Francis were suddenly asked to face Chiefs in Hamilton next Tuesday.
