Paul Stridgeon happy Lions not taking a gamble with days off in Queenstown
Tuesday 4 July 2017 17:38, UK
Strength and conditioning chief Paul Stridgeon says there is no gamble for the staff in giving British and Irish Lions players two days off in Queenstown.
The squad headed to the South Island resort after the 24-21 win over New Zealand on Saturday in Wellington, a victory that set up this Saturday's decider back at Eden Park in Auckland to perfection.
Queenstown is New Zealand's extreme sports centre and well known for its party atmosphere, but Stridgeon said the professionalism of the squad was strong, leading management not to need think about any kind of alcohol ban while they recuperated from last weekend's tough encounter.
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"We've run this blueprint with Warren a couple of times," said Stridgeon, who is on his third Lions tour and performs a similar coaching role for one of Europe's leading club sides, Toulon.
"We've done this in Wales a couple of times too; we did it in a big World Cup week with Wales and it paid off. Whenever we've done it we've performed well.
"With this group of players, we revisited this plan on Saturday. So we all agreed it was still best for the team.
"We feel each game the boys have been getting better and raising that intensity. We feel we took the All Blacks to a level in the second Test and we feel we'll be able to go higher again this weekend.
"We've not needed to put anything like that [alcohol ban] on the players. There's a lot of committees, the players made their own rules at the start in conjunction with the coaches.
"The players have been very professional, all very switched on. We've not had to put a policy on the boys. We had a social night early on in the tour but that was very helpful for bonding."
