Barnes: Gatland should have taken Schmidt to Oz

The make-up of Warren Gatland’s Lions playing squad may still be exercising opinions 10 days after its announcement but Stuart Barnes believes the Kiwi biggest error is the omission of Joe Schmidt from his backroom team for the tour to Australia.

Gatland, as he has with his players, opted largely for a group of coaches with whom he has an established working relationship and so it is that Rob Howley will oversee the Lions’ attack for the 10-match trip to Hong Kong and Australia.

“I’m not going to change what I have said from day one of this season and that is that Joe Schmidt should be the attack coach,” said Barnes yesterday at a Sky Sports event in Dublin. “I understand there is not much time to learn on a Lions tour and you need to trust your other coaches. I understand that, and Rob Howley is a good coach, but the Rob Howley thing is very similar to Matt O’Connor: they are both decent coaches and I have got nothing against them. But Schmidt is different class.