The Ireland lock Joe McCarthy is a doubt for the British & Irish Lions\u2019 second Test against the Wallabies due to a foot injury. Andy Farrell has called up Scotland\u2019s Gregor Brown to bolster his second-row ranks as a result, taking an already bloated squad to 45 players.<\/p>\n
McCarthy was taken off after 43 minutes of the Lions\u2019 27-19 victory over Australia<\/a> in Brisbane on Saturday and Farrell confirmed his early withdrawal was down to injury. \u201cIt\u2019s plantar fasciitis,\u201d said Farrell. \u201cIt was niggling away at him there. We got him off. Hopefully we got him off in time.\u201d<\/p>\n Brown becomes the latest addition to the squad following Scotland\u2019s victory over Samoa in Auckland on Friday and was due to arrive in Melbourne on Sunday along with compatriots Ewan Ashman and Rory Sutherland. With Darcy Graham having already arrived in camp, there are now 12 Scots in the squad, while Jamie George, Thomas Clarkson and Jamie Osborne are previous additional call-ups. Farrell is determined to rest his frontline stars for Tuesday\u2019s clash with the First Nations & Pasifika XV.<\/p>\n In Saturday\u2019s victory, Farrell\u2019s pack set the tone for the tourists, overpowering the Wallabies in a first-half onslaught. But he may be forced into a reshuffle in Melbourne.\u201cI thought we got the start really right, especially the forward pack,\u201d said the inside centre, Sione Tuipulotu. \u201cThe way they were knocking them back in the first 10 minutes sucked the life out of the Wallabies. Credit mainly to the forward pack, the way they started that game and really nipped them in the bud.\u201d<\/p>\n Farrell was quick to warn his players to beware of wounded Wallabies this week, referring to the 2013 tour when the Lions won the opener in Brisbane before Australia levelled the series in Melbourne. Joe Schmidt is confident his side will be bolstered by the ball-carrying power of Rob Valentini who is fit again after a calf problem.<\/p>\n Owen Farrell practises his kicking before the first Test against the Wallabies. Photograph: Patrick Hamilton\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Tuipulotu is only too aware of the threats he poses. \u201cI grew up with Rob Valentini, I know what he brings to the team,\u201d he said. \u201cGuys like Will Skelton and if they come off the injury list they\u2019ll definitely add. But they\u2019re all things that we need to prepare for. I thought we were pretty dominant but the good thing for us is that it was nowhere near our best performance. We\u2019ve still got a lot to work on.<\/p>\n \u201cThey have to be [desperate], don\u2019t they? Of course we expect that but I think the most important thing is we expect them to be desperate but not more desperate than us because we\u2019re trying to close out a series next Saturday.\u201d<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week’s action reviewed<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Farrell will name his side to face the First Nations and Pasifika XV on Monday. Owen Farrell is expected to make his first start of the tour and is a contender for the captaincy, along with Jamie George, Wales\u2019s Jac Morgan and the Ireland duo of Ryan and Josh van der Flier.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ireland lock Joe McCarthy is a doubt for the British & Irish Lions\u2019 second Test against the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[4151,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-277324","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114885541627287068","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}