Lions can still get justice over Horwill stamp where it matters most

Back to work . . . the Lions can still roar in Sydney

Australia are now favourites after their captain James Horwill has been cleared to play in the deciding Test against the Lions on Saturday. Ralph Ellis believes that just gives value to backing Warren Gatland's men...

The big Twitter campaign which ran across Australia demanding #justiceforhorwill has been a success. Australia's captain will be free to play in the deciding Test match against the Lions on Saturday.

Quite where that leaves us as far as justice for Alun-Wyn Jones, who had his face ground into the dirt by a stray boot from James Horwill during the first Test, I'm not sure. Even some of the "old school" rugby men like Will Carling and Brian Moore, people who played in the days when you dished it out and took it too, agree that Australia's captain has escaped punishment for what looked like a blatant stamp. Carling describes it as "classic legal BS getting in the way of honest rugby justice". Current England star Ugo Monye was even more straightforward, tweeting "what a joke".

But after two rounds of IRB inquiries, which seemed to involve more lawyers than your average Old Bailey fraud trial, Horwill has got off and, as they say, we move on. The immediate reaction of Betfair's market this morning has been to harden support for Australia ahead of the Sydney showdown. The Lions are now 2.226/5 outsiders to win the final Test and so land a series triumph for the first time in 16 years.
 
I think that's an over reaction. Just as Warren Gatland's side didn't deserve to be massive odds-on for the second Test purely on the basis of a lucky two point win in the first, so an equally tight home win in Brisbane shouldn't make the Aussies odds-on this time.

Horwill's escape does mean that Australia have their captain available while the Lions have lost their skipper Sam Warburton through injury. But there are plenty of leaders able to step up in his absence and it isn't a terminal blow. Of course it will be tight - the Lions to win by less than 12.5 points at a current price of 2.915/8 looks a tempting bet in the margin of victory market.

The tourists still have the man who has been the star of the series in George North - whose power in picking up and carrying his opposite winger Israel Folau has become one of the defining images of this or any Lions tour. The Welshman's try in the first Test was remarkable enough, but hauling along some 16 stones and 6ft 4ins of rugby player as if he was a small child was simply sensational.

The key thing for Gatland will be to work out how to get the ball out to North more often. The Welshman says himself today that he wants 15 or 16 touches in the course of 80 minutes to have a real effect on the game and in Brisbane he got only a third of that. It's something that the Lions will focus on this week, and the return of a fully fit Mike Phillips at scrum half will make a huge difference.

This isn't a great Australian team, even with their captain available. They don't have a reliable goal kicker (while Lions have Leigh Halfpenny with Owen Farrell on the bench), and in both matches they have continually lost the ball in contact. Gatland's men might feel that Alun-Wyn Jones has been let down by the disciplinary process - but they have every chance to make their own statement on the field of play. Winning is a much sweeter justice than leaving it to the lawyers.

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