Peter Jackson: Wales may rue Gatland snub for Edwards

Shaun Edwards spent the week keeping a profile low enough as to be positively subterranean over Warren Gatland's decision to make him surplus to Lions requirements. If the defence coach felt demoralised by what a friend described as a sense of having been let down, he was not going to let that sour a gracious declaration of support for the tour.  Elsewhere, the official confirmation of the split in the game's most decorated double act caught one of England's World Cup-winning management team unawares.
Phil Larder, defence coach under Sir Clive Woodward at the 2003 tournament two years after doing the same job for the Lions on their last tour of Australia, heard the news with a degree of gob-smacking incredulity.
“I was under the impression that Shaun and Warren were inseparable,” Larder said.  “So it was a big surprise to me that Shaun wasn't going.  He has proved himself to be an outstanding defensive coach but Warren has to select the people he thinks will make the best coaching team and blend well.”
Surprised he may be at the decision to exclude Edwards, Larder is unstinting in his praise of the coach Gatland has chosen instead, Andy Farrell – one ex-Wigan player for another.  Both were in the England squad under Larder's direction at the 1995 Rugby League World Cup when Australia beat them in the final at Wembley.
Farrell followed Edwards into international coaching only this year but has made a striking impact in a short time.   “Andy Farrell has done an excellent job with England,” Larder said.  “The players are very complimentary about the set-up under Stuart Lancaster and there seems no doubt that the most significant coach in the set-up is ‘Faz'
“I think Warren Gatland is a pretty good choice as head coach and we have to back him.  Wales played superbly 12 months ago and this season they've an unusual amount of bad luck with injuries which was bound to affect the team's performance.”
The Gatland-Edwards alliance has won all manner of titles since its formation ten years ago – four English Premiership titles and two European Cups with Wasps.  Since transferring their partnership to the Test arena five years ago, Wales have won two Grand Slams and appeared in a World Cup semi-final.
That will make his removal from the Lions panel hard to take, all the harder given that he went on the last tour, to South Africa four years ago. Knowing Edwards, he will find it difficult to understand why he should no longer be considered good enough.
Gatland's policy of mixing ‘continuity' from the last tour with a dash of ‘freshness' means that Rob Howley stays and Edwards goes.  In sticking with Wales' acting head coach, Gatland has decided against appointing another New Zealander, Joe Schmidt, whose Leinster team has been a class above anything produced in these islands over the last two seasons.
Schmidt, therefore, remains on the outside while three of his European Cup-winning team, Jonny Sexton, Brian O'Driscoll and Rob Kearney, will play critical roles in Australia next June if fit and firing.  As for preferring Farrell to Edwards, Gatland said:  “People speak incredibly highly of Andy Farrell. Having a fesh face will stimulate me and challenge me. I don't know all the answers. I hope this will improve me as a coach.”
Welsh fans will be concerned at the long-term effects of any lasting fall-out.   Both Gatland and Edwards are under contract until the World Cup in 2015 but contracts do not count for much if a relationship has been soured in the name of the Lions.
“It's very difficult being involved with the Lions and one of the international teams at the same time,” Larder said.  “There is a conflict of interest. Andy Robinson and I found out about that as the two English coaches when the Lions were last in Australia.
“We had a problem when neither of the English scrum-halves, Austin Healey and Matt Dawson, were selected for the Test team. Graham Henry had a massive problem because he'd been telling certain Welsh players that they were among the best in the world and then not selecting them in the Test team.”
Henry, then the world's highest paid coach, found the Lions tour so punishing and player-relationships so shattered that he left during the 2002 Six Nations before his five-year, £1.25m contract had run its full course. An embarrassing beating by Ireland in Dublin to the tune of 54-10 prompted the Kiwi to resign on the grounds that he was ‘absolutely b******d'.
“The intensity of the rugby that Wales and the Lions have played since I arrived, as well as the all-consuming nature of the job I came into, I believe has led to a burn-out factor in my coaching,” he said. “Being brutally honest, I feel the time has come for the team to hear a new voice.”
Henry felt that post-Lions he had lost the dressing-room for the only time in his career.  One of his inner cabinet with Wales, former international flanker Alun Carter, has said he believed Henry “signed his own death warrant as Wales coach” when he accepted the Lions job and that he returned “a broken man”.
Wales can only hope that history is not about to repeat itself and that Gatland, unlike Henry, will be able to see out his contract. As for the relationship with Edwards, getting that back on an even keel could be a different matter entirely.