Conor Murray: We need to do our homework on Warren Gatland's Wales

Murray has no intention of being lulled into a false sense of security at the prospect of playing against a team coached by a man he played under on the 2013, 2017 and 2021 Lions tours.

Murray during an Ireland rugby media conference at the Sport Ireland Campus Conference Centre in Dublin. Picture: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile

With 17 appearances for the British & Irish Lions across three tours, Conor Murray can claim to have been selected to play by Warren Gatland more times than 10 of the Wales matchday squad the New Zealander named to face Ireland in Dublin this Saturday.

It gives the veteran scrum-half and Test centurion the perfect vantage point to understanding what makes the Wales head coach tick but the 34-year-old Munster man also knows his former Lions boss is more than capable of springing a surprise or two every time he sends a team onto the field, especially a young and inexperienced one such as the current crop of Welshman in this 2024 Guinness Six Nations campaign.