“Justin Tipuric got a knock on his ankle last week. He’s fine but we are resting him as a precaution, while Adam Beard has got a sore wrist,” said Gatland.
“He’d probably be alright for Saturday, but we’ve made the change to bring in Jake Ball. We’re resting players when they are a little bit sore and taking out any risk.
“Gareth Anscombe has done a really good job on his knee – an ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) and a meniscus (cartilage). He did it when he made the break down the sideline.
“It wasn’t from a tackle, he just stepped off his right leg, and you can see the jarring on the video. He stayed on thinking he could run it off.
“When he asked the physios if he’d done any more damage by staying on they said, ‘No, you’d already done that and it wasn’t going to get any worse’.
“Unfortunately, he’s going to require surgery and it’s going to keep him out for most of the season.”
For the rest, there will be pressure to get back on the horse and push to extend Wales’ 10 match unbeaten run that stretches back to November 2017. Gatland expects a better performance that last week and knows he will get a response from his players.
“If some of them don’t front up and perform on Saturday, they are opening the door for someone else. That’s why we have chosen guys again for this weekend,” explained Gatland.
“If you’d have won last week and this weekend you’d pretty much have sealed a spot for the first game, or even couple of games, at the World Cup. That’s why we want to make the players aware they are under pressure.
“It’s easy to make a lot of changes, but some of the guys would have been disappointed with last weekend, particularly that first 20 minutes. It’s about giving them a chance to redeem themselves, giving them another chance by putting some pressure on them to perform.
“But let’s remember it’s a warm-up game for getting things right for the World Cup – it’s not a competition game, it’s about preparing for Japan.”
Even though Wales were beaten 33-19 at Twickenham, the game ended with each team scoring three tries. There were also a number of chances that went begging for Wales.
“We were disappointed with the first 20 minutes, when we went 14-0 down, but we probably dominated the last 60 minutes. It was 19-all during that period, so we expect to be better on Saturday with a game under our belt,” added Gatland.
“There was some good stuff, but unfortunately our errors and turn-over rates were pretty high. We will once again be encouraging players to be positive this weekend.
“Our decision-making was pretty good last weekend, although some of the executions weren’t. George North gave an inside pass to Gareth Anscombe which, if it had been a little softer, Gareth would have probably scored.
“If Liam Williams had given a better pass to George North down the left-hand side, he could have scored in the corner. We were pretty happy with the chances we created, it’s just our execution that needs to get a little better.
“We felt it was important that Dan Biggar started the game this weekend and had an opportunity because he’s been coming off the bench a lot for us. Tactically we can play different ways.
“You saw that in the Six Nations when we did it well against England. Last weekend we went out to play more attacking rugby and we made a lot more line breaks.”
