Furious Brian O'Driscoll has condemned South Africa coach Peter de Villiers for his reaction to the gouging incident involving Schalk Burger.
Burger was yellow-carded for making contact with Lions winger Luke Fitzgerald's eyes in the second Test in Pretoria on Saturday and subsequently banned for eight weeks.
Springbok coach de Villiers initially defended Burger after his side's dramatic 28-25 victory, before appearing to back down.
But O'Driscoll, who will return home from the tour after suffering concussion, said: "Irrespective of any apology, I find it an absolute disgrace that a coach of a national team can make comments as he did about gouging being part of the game.
"Someone made a really good point to me that kids or parents watching an interview like that, questioning whether they should have their kid play rugby or soccer, that's their decision made right there.
"To hear a national coach saying in any shape or form, gouging is acceptable in the modern-day game is despicable.
"I find that mind-boggling that you can have a national team coach saying something like that. Essentially, it brought the game into disrepute."
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