Great Britain Lions coach Wayne Bennett has defended his decision to hand Ash Handley a late call-up to his squad. Handley was brought in as cover following injuries to Ryan Hall and Oliver Gildart, but the Leeds winger will not feature in the final match of the tour against Papua New Guinea. “I wanted to bring him to Papua New Guinea, for some culture and experience,” Bennett said. “The reality is that we lost a number of players with injuries, a couple have gone home and they’re all outside backs. “We’ve lost three actually, last week against New Zealand we had to put Blake Austin there. I wasn’t sure he could get the job done or not but I was pretty confident he could. “We didn’t think we could bring someone out from England on Monday or Tuesday and play them in a Test match on the Saturday so, looking ahead to here and realising we could have more injuries, we brought him out as a precaution. “If we had more injuries, we could include him, if we didn’t, we’re happy with what we’ve got and we’ll go with that.” The Lions have lost all three of their Tests so far, to a Tongan Invitational XIII and twice to New Zealand, and the clash with PNG is their final chance to register a win.
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