'Farrell will churn up the Lions playing pool with instant intensity'

BBC News

03-07-2025

"You realise what comes of making a decision like this is all the periphery stuff, not the rugby decision. It becomes a major story for 48 hours and a big debate."That is the process I have gone through, but I would hate to think we made calls based on trying to avoid any criticism or [gain] public popularity."They could easily be the words of British and Irish Lions head coach Andy Farrell, standing by the decision to call up his son Owen.Instead, they come from 12 years earlier. A man in the same job, in the same city, but in a different era, with a different dilemma.Back then it was Warren Gatland defending his dropping of Lions legend Brian O'Driscoll for the series decider against the Wallabies. He installed Jamie Roberts and Jonathan Davies - the midfield he knew and trusted from his day job with Wales - in O'Driscoll's place.Lions calls are invariably controversial. The quality and quantity of those ignored is too great for these decisions to be easily accepted by everyone.However, the debate around Owen Farrell's call-up, like O'Driscoll's dropping, is turbo charged.Andy Farrell's harshest critics will claim that, regardless of Owen's on-pitch pedigree, blood ties have played a part.Andy and Owen are close. Andy was 16 when Owen was born. As a child, Owen would kick a ball about on the sidelines as his father captained Wigan. As a teenager Owen made his first Saracens appearance in a pre-season friendly against Western Force, replacing his father off the bench.As Owen's career has grown, Andy's words about his son have become careful and few.However, in 2023 he let his guard down after World Rugby attempted to reinstate a red card that would rule Owen out of some of England's Rugby World Cup campaign."When you're talking about somebody's son and asking the question, it's always going to be flawed," said Farrell, qualifying his opinion before describing the disciplinary process against Owen as "a disgusting circus".
There will be certainly be enough hot air expressed over Owen's Lions call-up to fill a big top or two.The case against is clear. Owen is short of form, fitness and top-level rugby.His last game was two months ago, when he was forced out of Racing 92's defeat by Lyon. His last Test rugby was nearly two years as part of England's run to the France 2023 semi-finals.His most recent club campaign was interrupted by injury, with a groin problem restricting his game time and place kicking.Racing, having flirted with relegation, finished 10th in the Top 14.Why, with the likes of Tom Scotland's Jordan and Wales' Blair Murray - both geographically closer, fitter, and less controversial - has Andy disrupted the Lions' Test preparations with the furore that will accompany Owen's call-up?Perhaps because that disruption is exactly what Farrell thinks the tourists need.Even allowing for another curveball call, Owen's chances of making the Test 23 are surely slim.Finn Russell seems secure as the Test 10 - Fin Smith is more likely to deputise for the Scot. Both are better suited to the more expansive style that Farrell has so far attempted to implement.At inside centre, Bundee Aki and Sione Tuipulotu offer a ball-carrying threat that Farrell, certainly at 33, doesn't. To include Farrell there would mean turning tactics on their head as well.On the bench, Marcus Smith's ability to cover full-back, with Blair Kinghorn and Hugo Keenan undercooked as yet, and fly-half looks more useful.What Farrell does offer though is an instant injection of intensity, just as the Wallabies bound into sight.At half-time of one match of the Lions' last visit to Australia, Alun Wyn Jones asked the great and the good huddled around him why the 21-year-old rookie in their midst was the one shouting loudest and asking most on the field.Johnny Sexton was on that tour. And was equally impressed.In October, before being included in Farrell's Lions coaching staff, he gave an interview to the Times newspaper, saying he would still have Farrell as his Test 10 for the 2025 tour."He's one of the best team-mates I've ever had," Sexton said."He's one of the best players I've ever played with. Who do you want in there when the going gets tough? Test-match animals."Every player who has shared a dressing room says the same. Farrell's appetite for the contest is insatiable. His drive to improve standards is constant.
It isn't always easy to have him as a team-mate. But winning isn't easy either.And, perhaps, Farrell Sr senses things have been over-easy down under."Unacceptable" was his verdict on the loss to Argentina, while slow starts and lost collisions against the Western Force and Queensland Reds suggest a side still short of a ruthless edge.Dropping Owen Farrell into the playing pool will certainly churn things up.Andy insisted in Thursday's news conference that Owen was a contender for a Test spot."If he didn't have a chance then what is the point, everybody should be competing," he said.However, in his second breath, he focused on the intangibles that might be his greatest influence on the fate of the series."Along with that, there is the experience he brings, the support that you need for the group and how you make the room feel," Andy added.Those ripples on the rest of the 37 players are hard to predict.Will Russell, who might reasonably have expected to be out of assistant coach Sexton and Farrell's shadow on this tour, feel any creative tension at 10?Will Maro Itoje's leadership be affected by the return of the man who was his long-time captain for both club and country?Will Owen himself, having stepped away from Test rugby after the scrutiny and jeers of the 2023 Rugby World Cup, enjoy the Aussie humour inevitably heading his way?The Lions drama just got a new character - and a whole lot more intriguing.