Louis Rees-Zammit believes Warren Gatland ' got it wrong' during Lions tour

Thursday, 04 November 2021 at 09:38

byRugby Rucker

Louis Rees-Zammit believes the Warren Gatland got his gameplan wrong in the British & Irish Lions series defeat to the Springboks earlier this year.

Despite the tourists kick off the series with a memorable victory in the opening Test, the Springboks battled back to clinch successive victories and a famous 2-1 series win.

In an interview with ‘s statistics, O’Driscoll beat a record 30 defenders in a single Six Nations campaign in 2000, but Van der Merwe bested that tally in the recently concluded tournament when he beat 31 defenders in the five Tests they played.

The Guardian, Rees-Zammit has now openly admitted that he felt the Lions had got it wrong.

“I personally think we could have played any gameplan. We had wingers with pace, we had wingers with physicality, we had centres with pace and we had a range of 10s who could have done anything," said Zammit.

"That was probably the worst bit. Everyone thought we could have done a bit more in terms of playing. You heard it from fans and people who weren’t there.

"They just wish we’d played a bit more rugby, as opposed to sitting back and trying to play their game. We tried to stick with our plan but it didn’t end up working.”

“I don’t want to be the bitch but I just thought we had the wrong gameplan, to be honest,” Rees-Zammit added. “If we’d played a bit of rugby I think we could have given them a better test but we ended up falling into their gameplan and that cost us the series.”

Rees-Zammit’s and 5 other rugby brothers who represented different countries

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Louis Rees-Zammit's elder brother Taylor, was out in Ljubljana making his international debut for Malta against Slovenia last weekend.

Below, we look at five other siblings who represented different countries.

#1. Duhan van de Merwe (Scotland) & Akker van der Merwe (South Africa)

Edinburgh and Scotland powerhouse Duhan is the younger brother of Akker, also a professional rugby union player who plays at hooker for Sale Sharks and South Africa.

The two could face off this summer when the British & Irish Lions face the Springboks, with their parents reportedly having a half and half jersey manufactured ahead of the test series.

DID YOU KNOW? According to Opta

#2. Billy Burns (Ireland) & Freddie Burns (England)

Billy made his debut for Ireland as a replacement for Johnny Sexton against Wales during the Autumn Nations Cup in 2020. Older brother Freddie, who rejoins Leicester Tigers this summer, won 5 caps for England between 2012 and 2014.

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#3. Bridget Millar-Mills (Scotland) & Harriet Millar-Mills (England)

They made history in 2013 as the first sisters to face each other in a rugby international. The two both grew up in Manchester, but Bridget chose to represent Scotland owing to their mother, who grew up in Hamilton.

#4. Manu Tuilagi & All of his Brothers (Samoa)

England international Manu is the younger brother of Freddie, Henry, Alesana, Anitelea and Sanele Vavae Tuilagi, all of whom are Samoan internationals and also played for Leicester

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#5. Charles Piutau (New Zealand) & Siale Piutau (Tonga)

Tonga international Siale is the elder brother of New Zealand international Charles Piutau. The pair currently play for Bristol Bears in the Gallagher Premiership.