Lions will not roar until changes come

THE legacy of the Lions failed Test series bid in Australia will be a fundamental change to future tours and the end of a proud rugby tradition.

Starting with the 2005 tour to New Zealand, the Lions will not play midweek matches and will take part in just a limited number of warm-up Saturday games against Super 12 opponents before a three Test series.

The 2001 Australia tour,even if the Lions had reversed Saturday's 29-23 deciding Test score, would still have been the last to feature a traditional mix of matches.

This break with the past, when the Lions toured the entire host country spreading the rugby gospel, is desperately sad but a natural move for a professional game bedevilled by too many fixtures in the Northern Hemisphere.

The players who survived this six week, 10-match tour - the shortest in history - were in pieces after the Third Test having come on tour with injuries sustained in domestic rugby in the Four Home Unions.

Eight players, headed by Law rence Dallaglio and Dan Luger, left the tour with serious injuries while a host of others, including Scott Quinnell and Neil Jenkins just about lasted the course and are now going home for knee surgery.

After discussing the failings of the Lions tour with senior members of the party, I believe it is vital the organisers of the 2005 trip to New Zealand ensure that

* The Lions do not tour with 37 players again as this gives non- Test players little incentive to keep involved and creates unnecessary division in the camp.

* There must be sufficient time between the end of the domestic British and Irish seasons to allow the tour party to properly'gel'together.

* Players are not allow ed to write or contribute to columns or web sites during the tour.

The recurring message from all those involved in the playing side of this tour was that the squad had been "flogged" on the training pitch by a coaching staff obsessed by a lack of preparation time.

Even Jason Robinson, who had been brought up in the professional league game,found the going tough and the lack of free time a problem.

Getting the balance right on any tour is critical to running a happy ship and on this particular vessel the number of disgruntled players below decks increased with the length of the voyage. Some of the carping can be dismissed as the whingeing of those not involved in the Test squad, but the sheer weight of evidence suggests there were important reasons for players to feel used and abused.

D avid Young, the midweek captain, felt his team had been marooned in Australia and the Cardiff prop was,at one point, left to coach the players himself.

Those same players had satinaroom at Tylney Hall just weeks earlier and heard the tour management insist the Test team was not already settled and everyone had a chance of making the side.Patently, that wasn'ttrue and this was rammed home after the midweek side lost to Australia A in Gosford.

In a move thatrevealed the cold and calculating side to coach Graham Henry, he publicly announced the midw eek team was going to be sacrificed in a bid to bring Test success.That meant w hen Henry needed to call on replacements to bolster the first team, he had to use players already in a negative mind set. It was a major tactical mistake and reflected badly on all those w ho supported it within the management team of Donal Lenihan and coaches Henry, Andy Robinson and Phil Larder .

I expressed concerns about Henry w hen he was appointed, because this was a New Zealander with the task of bringing together the best of four very different countries. His approach was confirm ation of his past as a school headmaster and he remained largely aloof from the players.

It almost worked with a narrow defeat in the final Test and he can justly claim the Lions were better forfour of the six halves of rugby in the series, But, they failed to score in the last 20 minutes of each Test and that betrayed a tiredness that the players brought on tour after a long domestic season and was increased by the tough training regime.

I do not believe Ian McGeechan, Lions coach in 1989, 1993 and 1997, would have made the same mistakes because he understands better than anyone w hatit takes to create a successful Lions party.

It includes reading the signs of prob -lems within the squad, the ease to w hich groups can be created on national lines and how important it is to keep everyone motivated.

T he 1997 Lions who won a Test series in South Africa used to fine each other if groups of four or more players were spotted from the same country.

It meant other nationalities were dragged on to tables for meals to stave off the fines and was a great way of blending everyone together.That kind of feeling never existed on this tour.

T he series, won 2-1 by the worldcham-pion Wallabies,turned during the opening minutes of the second half of the Second Test when the Lions handed two tries to the home side. It was an infusion of confidence the Wallabies needed and they never looked back.

T he 2001 tour will be remembered by the squad and those who followed them, as a missed opportunity in so many ways.You should never end a tour with the words "if only" but they were ringing loud and clear in Manly on Sunday morning as the injuries, the match costing errors, the over training, the too few games and unnecessary view s expressed in newspaper columns were digested.

It left a hollow feeling in the stomach.

Lions 2001 tour record: Played: 10, Won 7, Lost 3; Tests: Lions 29, Australia 13; Australia 35, Lions 14; Australia 29, Lions 23.

Copyright 2001
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