Andy Farrell accuses British & Irish Lions opponents of OVER-WATERING the pitch - despite Sydney being hit by a 'weather bomb'

Lions coach Andy Farrell accused the Waratahs of over-watering the pitch to create slippery conditions after his team’s scrappy victory in Sydney.

The tourists were expected to run up a bigger scoreline against the Super Rugby team but they were turned-over 20 times by their dogged opponents.

There has been three days of sunshine since Sydney was hit by a ‘weather bomb’ and Farrell has suspicions about the amount of water on the pitch.

We have been here for two days now and it has been glorious,’ said the Lions coach. ‘For whatever reason, and I actually don't care, it's great for us, the pitch was very wet. I was asking Mike Catt [the Waratahs coach] after the game and he was laughing. I mean, that's good tactics from them, isn't it? That the ball's slippy, the breakdown's ferocious enough. We've seen that done plenty of times.

‘I don't know whether the pitch needed watering. And we kept on trying to overplay at times, certainly around halfway and putting ourselves back under pressure and keeping them in the game really. So I believe that it could be wet on Wednesday anyway, so we'll take that.’

The Lions have a day off on Sunday before they travel to Canberra to face the Brumbies. Farrell confirmed that his son, Owen, will not be ready for the fixture after landing into Australia on Friday night.

He also revealed that young back-row Henry Pollock pulled out of Saturday’s match due to a calf strain. ‘We had a bit of an awareness on a calf strain that was tight enough this morning,’ said Farrell. ‘So knowing what we knew, there was no need to risk him.’