Gareth Jenkins feels that all the Welsh players in the British & Irish Lions squad were chosen totally on merit – and believes several of them are serious Test team candidates.
Jenkins, one of Sir Clive Woodward’s Lions coaching staff, said: "Maybe the Welsh contingent is not high in quantity, but it is definitely there in quality.
"There are probably six or seven candidates that if we were picking the Test team this week, they would be actually Test players.
"There were strong candidates in every position as far as Wales were concerned, and the boys who haven’t made it, I really feel for.
"When we actually challenged the selection process, the one thing we were all pretty clear about was that every player we discussed didn’t have a national tag on him. He wasn’t a
Welsh player, English, Scottish or Irish – he was a candidate and we worked hard to maintain that."
Of the Welsh contingent, centre Gavin Henson, scrum half Dwayne Peel, prop Gethin Jenkins and Jones will all undoubtedly challenge for the Test team, while the claims of their colleagues also cannot be ignored.
