WARREN Gatland felt the wrath of Ross Moriarty after benching him for Wales’ World Cup opener against Georgia – but the back row forward was soon playing his part in preparations.

Moriarty is the victim of Dragons teammate Aaron Wainwright’s fine summer form, dropping to the bench for Monday’s clash.

Wainwright partners Justin Tipuric and Josh Navidi with 34-times capped Moriarty reduced to the role of impact sub.

After starting his Test career on the bench, the 25-year-old has been a key figure in recent seasons with only one of his last 29 outings being as a replacement.

"He is not too happy with me with him not being in the side, but I have to say that from the initial disappointment and the chat we had, he's turned that around," Gatland said.

"He's been positive, vocal at training and he's been what you expect of someone who knows they are disappointed but also knows what their role is in the team, which is to help the side prepare. That's all I can ask as a coach."

 

Gatland goes with his big guns for the clash against Georgia despite a six-day turnaround to Sunday’s key clash with Australia, who beat Fiji on opening weekend.

"There was a little bit of edge and niggle at training (on Saturday). To me, that's always a good sign. The players know the game is coming close," said Gatland.

"I said to the players after training, 'we've had our warm-up games - we're in competition phase now, and that's when we thrive'.

"We are Grand Slam champions, had 14 games in a row unbeaten and that was because of the way we prepared, mentally how tough we were, our game management, and I thought today there was that edge.

"We know that when we prepare well and train well and everything is right, we're a tough team to beat and can beat anyone.

"We've worked incredibly hard to get to where we are and achieve what we've achieved in the last few years, and we need to make sure we go out and give our best at this World Cup."