Wales say Dwayne Peel left out of World Cup squad on Sale's advice

Warren Gatland has hit back at criticism from Sale over Wales's treatment of their Lions scrum-half Dwayne Peel, who will not be among the 30 players the coach names next week in his World Cup squad. Peel, who has 76 caps, has not been used by Gatland in Wales's three warm-up matches, not least because the scrum-half, under Premiership Rugby's player release rule, was not allowed to train with the squad until 4 August, two days before their first match of the month, against England at Twickenham. Gatland confirmed that Peel would not be in the 30 when it is named on Monday. He said earlier in the week that the reason the 30-year-old had not been called up for training was that Sale told the management that he was not fit, but the Sharks' executive director of sport, Steve Diamond, said no one from Wales had asked him about Peel and if they had he would have said fitness was not an issue. "Dwayne did have a finger injury but he has not missed one single training session since 6 June," Diamond said. "He was declared to go into contact last month and it is not right for Wales to say he is injured. The Wales management have not discussed Dwayne or any of our other Welsh players in the six months I have been back at the club. They have not played ball with any of the Premiership clubs when it comes to their players." Gatland admitted that he had not spoken to Diamond, saying: "He has a hands-off role. The day-to-day coaching is done by Tony Hanks and I have spoken to him a number of times about his players, including Dwayne and Andy Powell, and I met him in London last week. "I was disappointed to read Diamond's comments and the articles this week have been typical of the shit-stirring of the Welsh media. We received an email from the Sale physiotherapist on 8 August which said Dwayne had a problem with his hip and was not taking part in contact training. We used that information to make the decision not to include him. "The way we have been training in the last couple of months has been very physical and because Dwayne was not available to train with us in July there was always going to be a question mark over his fitness. That does not mean that if there is an injury to an experienced player like Mike Phillips that we would not go to Dwayne." Powell, who was signed by Hanks when he was in charge of Wasps last season before having his deal terminated after he was involved in an incident in a London pub, will play for Wales against Argentina in Cardiff at No8 after Ryan Jones withdrew from the side with a calf injury. Gatland said Jones could have played but, in a week when he had lost his captain, Matthew Rees , and Gavin Henson from his World Cup squad, and with Gethin Jenkins struggling with injury, he was not prepared to risk another experienced player. "Ryan is important to us because of his quality, experience and flexibility," Gatland said. "He wanted to play, but I said he had missed out on two World Cups and I did not want to risk making it three. Tony Hanks has told me that Sale have been impressed with Andy who gets the chance to show what physical impact he can make." Gatland is still undecided about whether to include 16 or 17 forwards in his squad. Wales's first match in the World Cup is against South Africa, who welcome New Zealand on Saturday looking to avoid a whitewash in the Tri-Nations after losing their first three matches. "You can tell the pressure is on them because the performance of the national side has been debated in parliament," Gatland said. "It will be interesting to see how they get on against an All Blacks side missing Richie McCaw, Dan Carter and a few other players. You never write them off even after they have lost a few games. They are a proud rugby nation."