British and Irish Lions head coach Warren Gatland has said that his side are "getting better each week" as they gear up for their crunch first Test with New Zealand.
The Lions earned a comfortable 34-6 win over Chiefs on Tuesday morning to make it back-to-back victories for the first time on their 2017 tour, building on the equally-straightforward triumph over Maori All Blacks three days ago.
Gatland is happy with the latest showing produced by his side and was particularly pleased by the level of finishing on show, with Jack Nowell crossing over twice in Hamilton and Jared Payne adding a third.
Asked if his side are hitting peak form, he told Sky Sports News: "I hope so. We're in pretty good shape. We're up against it, but we're getting better each week. We always said we'd get better the longer the tour went on.
"There are still things to work on, but this was a really important result for those players who had been in front in the other two midweek games only to let those leads slip. We squeezed them and played some good rugby. That try that Jared Payne scored was pretty impressive and Jack Nowell scored a couple of tries as well, so we're starting to finish a little bit.
"That comes from spending time together. We know we have a few things to tidy up, but we took the legs from them and that enabled us to play some good rugby. The guys are pretty happy in the changing room. We had a couple of songs, so there's good spirit and this was a great result for this group of players."
The Lions take on New Zealand at Eden Park on Saturday morning in the first of their three Test outings .
Daniel Lewis
