I argued the toss with Gatland over O’Driscoll. He knows how big a call he’s made

It’s a dozen years since our columnist was manager of the Lions tour heading into a decisive final test in Sydney. He’s been facing his demons this week.

This was always going to be the most difficult and challenging week of Warren Gatland’s coaching career, even before he decided to omit Brian O’Driscoll from the match-day squad for today’s deciding Test.

The last week of any tour is challenging at the best of times, for the Lions even more so. Had they been told at the outset of their trek that they would still be contending for series honours when they arrived for the finale in Sydney, I am sure they would have taken it.

Yet, as with all tours of this nature, the journey to this point dictates the mood. O’Driscoll will appreciate this more than anyone else in the Lions squad given that he was part of the last Lions party to make it this far and still be in contention. I remember that week too, even if I have suppressed the pain of losing that epic series against Australia back in this city in 2001.

This tour has been cathartic in many ways as it has forced me to face my demons. I’ve had no choice. Over the years, but especially over the last few weeks, people come up to me and recall the DVD of that 2001 tour with kind references to some of the speeches and dressing room scenes that, to be perfectly honest, I would rather forget about.

I have never watched that deciding third Test at Stadium Australia, the venue again for today’s decider, which, in another bow to commercialism, has been renamed the ANZ Stadium. It has been difficult to avoid that 2001 series as it is being replayed on tv here on an almost daily basis. I can gladly sit through Jason Robinson’s stunning opening try or that magnificent effort from O’Driscoll which ironically now, 12 years on, is set to be his signature moment in a Lions shirt even though he’s been on three more tours since.

On the eve of this year’s opening Test, I shared a podium with the Wallaby who did most to destroy the dream in the second Test back in 2001. I didn’t realise until watching the highlights that evening that Joe Roff scored his intercept try off Jonny Wilkinson’s ill-judged pass within 40 seconds of the second half commencing and a second, against the run of play, within four minutes. It defined his career and left a void in mine.

Losing that test with the series in our grasp after completely dominating a Wallaby side for three of the opening four halves of the first two Tests was a massive blow and left us flat for the final battle. Remember at the time they were holders of the World Cup, Tri Nations and Bledisloe Cup.

I haven’t witnessed that look of horror on a collective group of players since, until Leigh Halfpenny’s missed kick at the death in Melbourne last weekend. The Lions look drained, just as we were 12 years ago. The mistake we made as a management group then was working the players too hard at the outset of the tour, which left them with little or nothing to give in the week of the final Test. That said, it is unlikely we would have reached that point against such an outstanding side without doing the work.

I could see it in the players’ eyes but no matter what we said, no matter how we emphasised that this would be a defining week in their lives and how important it was to recognise it and seize the moment, the spark had gone. I had an empty feeling in my stomach throughout that week and brilliantly though the players performed in very difficult circumstances, they just couldn’t quite close it out despite coming very, very close.

The difficult thing now when I bump into any of that group of Lions is that they all harbour serious regrets over losing that game and would love to have that week back again. Martin Johnson has articulated on a number of occasions how it still haunts him.

I spoke to Warren Gatland last Wednesday night in Noosa and tried to convey that feeling of a lost week and a lost opportunity because when I visited the team hotel for the announcement of the side earlier in the day, I sensed that same atmosphere. The current squad had gambled everything on closing out the series in Melbourne and appeared as if they still hadn’t come to terms with that defeat.

Gatland appreciated that leaving O’Driscoll out of the starting line up was a massive call, but you have to admire his honesty and guts for making what he perceives to be the right call, made in his mind, for the right reasons. I didn’t make his plight any easier by informing him that the reaction back home was akin to the fallout after the Roy Keane affair in Saipan. Gatland was living in Galway and coaching Ireland in the summer of 2002 and understood exactly where I was coming from.

There is a feeling within the Lions management that O’Driscoll was out on his feet in the final quarter last weekend and that his legs are gone. I argued that he has the capacity to unlock the Wallaby defence in a manner that the other threequarters are not capable of and that he is still the best in the business at marshalling a defence. He appreciated that view too and I have no doubt the same points were aired in detail in the selection meeting. Unfortunately, there was no Irish man in that room to articulate them forcibly.

In the days building up to that 2001 decider, the heavens opened in Sydney which only added to the difficulties in training. It didn’t help either that because of a disastrous run of injuries, we were unable to run the starting side in training at any stage during the week.

The difficulty with a Lions tour is that come the last week, there are 15 players who have little or no part to play and in their own minds would rather be anywhere else than on a training pitch after an 11 month season of non-stop activity.

I discussed the point with Gatland that there is actually a case to be made for releasing certain players from tour duty at that stage as it would guarantee that everyone within the party is 100% focused on the only thing that matters that week — winning a Test match. He could see where I was coming from but it is so difficult when you have been preaching the importance of the squad ethic for the previous seven weeks to change tack at the final hurdle.

It’s an issue that doesn’t arise within a national squad as the players within that group will be with you for seasons to come. With a Lions squad there is no tomorrow. You win or lose together, disperse and in most instances never assemble again. It is that clinical.

So what’s going to happen today? I have relied on my gut feeling to call the Tests so far and it has provided a reliable barometer. I felt the Lions would win the opening Test but be pushed much harder than most were predicting. And that is exactly what happened.

From the moment Gatland announced the team for the second Test, I couldn’t see anything other than a win for Australia. After events in Noosa this week, the clearing of James Horwill after the ridiculous circus conducted by the IRB and the recall of the great George Smith, my gut is telling me the Wallabies look set to repeat the dose handed out in the same stadium on the last visit.

I so badly want to be wrong.