Rob Howley: Lions tourists set to unleash rugby chaos

From ‘Warrenball’ to ‘rugby chaos’, if the British & Irish Lions achieve nothing else on this tour of New Zealand, they have at least helped broaden the lexicon of the sport.

Attack coach Rob Howley yesterday echoed head coach Warren Gatland’s spiky rebuttal of the former term, refuting the accusation that the tourists will be relying on the one-dimensional physicality the New Zealander has been portrayed as employing during his almost 10 years as the Welsh boss and two tours in charge of the Lions.

Instead, the former Wales and Lions scrum-half believes that only by spreading chaos through heads-up rugby rather than a prescriptive gameplan can they defeat an All Blacks outfit he described as the most ruthless in world rugby. Toppling back-to-back world champions New Zealand over three Test matches on their own turf would be no mean feat and the Lions looked a million miles away from being at the required standard to do so in last Saturday’s tour opener against the Provincial Barbarians. Jet-lagged and let down by unforced errors and poor execution, they laboured to a 13-7 win in Whangarei, but Howley believes the tourists are building towards unleashing rugby chaos on the All Blacks in the first Test in Auckland on June 24.