Warren Gatland labels rant by Rassie Erasmus as ‘unusual’ and insists he received’t take to social media to specific views on refereeing selections after Lions lose second Check to South Africa

Warren Gatland has labelled the extraordinary rant earlier this week by South Africa director of rugby Rassie Erasmus as ‘unusual’.

Erasmus raised a variety of considerations over the officiating of referee Nic Berry within the Springboks’ 22-17 defeat in final Saturday’s first Check at Cape City Stadium.

He additionally defended his position as a water provider and accused Berry of treating house captain Siya Kolisi in a different way to Alun Wyn Jones, the vacationers’ skipper.

The second Check, performed in Johannesburg, went the way in which of the house facet, who ran out 27-9 winners to degree the collection.

Nonetheless, the Lions could really feel aggrieved by sure selections made by official Ben O’Keeffe, who opted to not ship off Springboks star Cheslin Kolbe, who was sin binned for a harmful sort out on Conor Murray.

However Gatland insists he received’t be following his reverse quantity’s lead when commenting on the referee’s efficiency.

Gatland stated: “We’ve obtained methods and processes in place and hopefully World Rugby does take a look at that by way of ensuring everybody follows the protocols.

“I feel that’s vital. We do press conferences to attempt to provide you with guys [the media] some data and we cope with the referees and World Rugby.

“I simply hope it doesn’t get to a scenario the place you find yourself with issues on Twitter and other people airing their views that method and never by means of the correct channels.

“I discovered it [Erasmus’ video] fairly unusual that that method was taken and it’s undoubtedly not one thing that I’ll get entangled with. It’s vital we maintain the integrity of the sport up as a lot as we probably can.

 “I simply thought it was very attention-grabbing. Sufficient has been stated about that and I received’t be occurring social media. I don’t actually wish to touch upon that as a result of I wish to let different folks maintain that.

“The very last thing we’d like is a disagreement and being accused of doing sure issues. It’s superb to me how the narrative modified concerning the TMO, I didn’t make one remark main as much as the sport final week and but I used to be accused of questioning his integrity.

“We’ll simply maintain issues to ourselves and undergo the correct channels after we cope with the referee and speak to the referee after reviewing the sport so hopefully we’ll get some suggestions from him and hopefully we’ll give him suggestions.”