Warren Gatland hopes scrum-half Mike Phillips has learned a valuable lesson after he survived the axe to be included in the Wales side for Saturday's Grand Slam showdown with France.
Phillips was sin-binned during the first-half of last weekend's victory over Ireland for dropping a knee on Marcus Horan and Gatland revealed that indiscipline could have cost him his place.
Gatland has already proven during this tournament, when Alix Popham was dropped after the win over England, that he is determined to eradicate indiscipline.
Phillips was nervous over the selection but Gatland believes he could become one of the world's most dominant scrum-halves and decided to retain his services.
Gatland explained: "I talked to Mike after the game. Discipline is one area we are really trying to work on and hopefully Mike learns from that. If the result had been different perhaps it could have cost him his place.
"There was a thought process during the sin-binning whether to replace him and put Dwayne Peel on but we decided to give him an opportunity to make amends and I thought he responded greatly.
"I hope there has been a lesson in it because I have told Mike he can be the biggest, most physical, imposing scrum-half in world rugby.
"He thinks he already is - and he told me he is the best looking as well! There is no shortage of confidence in Mike.
"Apart from his sin-binning it was a very pleasing performance last week. His kicking game was great and you saw his physicality in the try-saving tackle against Shane Horgan.
"His first performance against England was great. I thought he dropped off against Scotland, he probably tried a bit too much and he needs to get the balance right.
"But sitting on the bench against Italy gave him a chance to reassess what we were looking for and he has responded really well."
Phillips will link up again with his Ospreys team-mate James Hook, who won a tight selection battle to reclaim the fly-half jersey from Stephen Jones.
Gatland added: "Just like every game we have looked at the 10 situation and who would do the best job. We have afforded ourselves the luxury of bringing in James Hook.
"We have spoken to the players and we feel that, against France, James gives us slightly more attacking options.
"It is no consolation to Stephen but coming off the bench he gives us that maturity and experience in being able to change a game if we need to, or close it down.
"It definitely ranks up there as one of the hardest decisions I have had to make. Sometimes you have got to make those calls and when you have got to let players down, that is the hardest side of the job."
The only other change from the 16-12 win at Croke Park, which sealed Wales the Triple Crown, was the return of hooker Huw Bennett, who missed out in Ireland after catching the 'flu.
Wales can afford to lose by 19 points on Saturday and still be crowned Six Nations champions - but they are determined to finish the campaign on an historic high with a 10th Grand Slam triumph.
"It will be nice if we can take the championship, but we'd like to be doing it with a win over France. To win on points difference would be something of a hollow victory," said Gatland.
"We have already achieved something in this campaign that can't be taken away from us with the Triple Crown, but we have an opportunity now to push on and do something a little bit special in front of our home crowd.
"We are confident, we have worked hard and if we continue in the same vein in which we started this campaign we believe we can come away with a deserved victory."
Teams:
Wales: L Byrne (Ospreys); M Jones (Llanelli Scarlets), T Shanklin (Cardiff Blues), G Henson (Ospreys), S Williams (Ospreys); J Hook (Ospreys), M Phillips (Ospreys); G Jenkins (Cardiff Blues), H Bennett (Ospreys), A Jones (Ospreys), I Gough (Ospreys), AW Jones (Ospreys), J Thomas (Ospreys), M Williams (Cardiff Blues), R Jones (Ospreys, capt).
Replacements: M Rees (Llanelli Scarlets), D Jones (Ospreys), I Evans (Ospreys), G Delve (Gloucester), D Peel (Llanelli Scarlets), S Jones (Llanelli Scarlets), S Parker (Ospreys).
France: A Floch (Clermont-Auvergne); V Clerc, Y Jauzion (both Toulouse), D Traille (Biarritz), J Malzieu (Clermont-Auvergne); D Skrela (Stade Francais), J-B Elissalde (Toulouse); F Barcella (Auch), D Szarzewski (Stade Francais), N Mas (Perpignan), L Nallet (Castres, capt), J Thion (Biarritz), T Dusautoir (Toulouse), F Ouedraogo (Montpellier), J Bonnaire (Clermont-Auvergne).
Replacements: W Servat, J-B Poux (both Toulouse), A Mela (Albi), E Vermeulen (Clermont-Auvergne), D Yachvili (Biarritz), F Trinh-Duc (Montpellier), C Heymans (Toulouse).
More news from SportingLife.com
