O’Driscoll joins third Test absentee list
CENTRE Brian O’Driscoll has become the latest British and Irish Lions player to be ruled out of Saturday’s third and final Test through injury.
O’Driscoll suffered concussion in last weekend’s series-clinching defeat in Pretoria, and doctors have decided he will not recover in time to finish the tour. Prop Adam Jones joins O’Driscoll in returning home, where he will continue his rehabilitation from the dislocated shoulder he sustained in the second Test.
Jones’s front-row colleague Gethin Jenkins will stay with the squad despite his fractured cheekbone, but is definitely out of the dead rubber in Johannesburg.
Winger Tommy Bowe and centre Jamie Roberts – the other two Lions players hospitalised in the dramatic and bruising 28-25 defeat – could yet recover from elbow and wrist injuries respectively by the weekend.
South Africa, meanwhile, have confirmed they will appeal the two-week ban handed to lock Bakkies Botha for the shoulder charge that injured Jones. Botha escaped punishment during the match but was cited after the Test and, following a disciplinary hearing on Sunday, suspended for a fortnight.
But the Springboks, who have adopted an unapologetically aggressive stance throughout the series, insist Botha acted legally.
“We certainly don’t see any wrong-doing in that challenge and if it wasn’t for the injury which came from it, I don’t think anything would have been said about it,” said assistant coach Dick Muir. “It is a major concern for us.”
South Africa will not, however, appeal the eight-week suspension handed to flanker Schalk Burger for gouging the eyes of Lions winger Luke Fitzgerald.