For the British and Irish Lions, it was their second loss of their tour ahead of next week’s first Test against the All Blacks.
The Lions finally found their attacking mojo, scoring three tries to two – more than doubling their try tally so far – but lost from a winning position through a late penalty.
They now have two wins and two losses after four outings on their gruelling 10-match New Zealand tour, with the first Test in Auckland looming a week on Saturday.
Here, we look at the key takeaways from the clash.
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HOW DID THEY LOSE THAT ONE?
This one will really hurt the Lions. Leading 22-13 after 54 minutes and with the Highlanders at their mercy the Lions let their chance slip to rack up back-to-back victories over Kiwi Super Rugby sides. The Landers bench proved much stronger then the Lions and it was the hosts this time who dealt better with the pressure. A bitter blow for Gatland’s squad as once again their discipline let them down to give away stupid penalties that turned the match.
DIRT-TRACKERS PLAYING THEIR WAY OF THE TEST SQUAD
At almost the halfway point of the tour, players are desperately trying to put themselves into test contention. But with the ‘mid-week’ team now losing two matches in a row, while the ‘test’ team defeated the much vaunted Crusaders, the Lions squad is being split very definitely along the lines of “dirt-trackers” and first-choice players. A number of players will be kicking themselves they did not grab this chance to put themselves back into contention.
TO SAM OR NOT TO SAM
Lions coach Warren Gatland has a big call coming up about what he does with the tour captain Sam Warburton with the tests approaching. Warburton was poor against the Provincial Barbarians but was much better against the Highlanders, even scoring a try. The Lions test backrow looks set to be Faletau, O’Brien and O’Mahony but on this showing Gatland may be convinced to given Warburton a chance. But how does he fit him in?
The Lions went down in Dunedin.
BIG BIG ‘D’
What will be hugely disappointing for the Lions is their defence was excellent up until the moment they let in an incredibly soft try to Highlanders hooker Liam Coltman through a rolling maul in the 60th minute. The Lions super-swift line speed in defence had the Landers rattled, just as it did the Crusaders and to let the home team off the hook to steal a win they hardly deserved will have defence coach Andy Farrell questioning what went wrong.
MIND YOUR HEAD
HIA or Head Injury Assessment now becomes critical for the Lions. Two key players – centre Jonathan Davies and lock Courtney Lawes – will have to go through the protocol now to see when they can return to the playing field. Davies urgently needs more time to work on his combination with Ben Te’o while Lawes needs another shot to earn a test spot. Lawes was dominant until he was removed after 27 minutes and his absence really hurt the Lions.
