Rugby World Cup 2015: Wales coach Warren Gatland gambles by dropping three Lions from his squad

Any coach bold enough to drop a player as revered as the great Irish centre Brian O’Driscoll from a Lions Test team at the tipping point of a series against Australia is unlikely to quake at the thought of sacrificing a sacred cow ahead of a World Cup – especially if the specimen concerned is a little long in the tooth and entirely out of sorts. But two sacred cows? Three? A cull on this scale is either brave or foolhardy… or maybe both.