Lions chief holds showdown talks with Australia as row over squad blows up

Wallaby boss Joe Schmidt has been forced into a climbdown and has released more players to face the Lions in pre-Test games. ARU chief executive Phil Waugh and Lions CEO Ben Calveley met in Perth on Wednesday with the row which has dominated the tour top of the agenda.

One of the upshots of the summit was Schmidt letting Reds hooker Matt Faessler and centre Hunter Paisami play against the tourists next Wednesday.

Six other Reds players will stay in Wallaby camp to preparing for their game against Fiji on July 6 but Schmidt has allowed five Western Force players to face the Lions on Saturday.

Lions assistant coach Andrew Goodman said: “It’s a once-in-a-life opportunity for most of those guys so the level of intensity is going to be through the roof.”

The Lions have been at loggerheads with Schmidt since he announced he wanted to ringfence a group of around 25 Wallabies to protect them for the Tests.

The Lions say release is in the pre-tour agreement which also shares profits between the touring party and the ARU.

But Schmidt claimed on Tuesday he had read the contract and claimed it did specify every Wallaby playing for his Super Rugby province ahead of the Test series.

Goodman revealed Ireland full-back Hugo Keenan is not in full training and is struggling to make Saturday’s game with calf trouble. But scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park, who has a glute injury, trained on Wednesday and Huw Jones, the Scotland centre, is fit.