It was so amateurish in 1997, English players had to face Australia after third Lions Test

Telegraph

30-07-2025

The Lions' victory, pipping Australia at the post, in Saturday's second Test in Melbourne was just magnificent. I have exchanged a couple of texts with Andy Farrell this week. The dream lives on! What the Lions are; it just gets better...
The tourists this week will aim for the first 3-0 whitewash of the professional era and are seeking to complete the first unbeaten tour on foreign soil since I was part of the playing squad in South Africa in 1974 – although, we did win 3-0 in a four-Test series – and the first Test clean sweep since 1927 in Argentina.
Farrell and his coaches have made clear their ambition to go and win the series 3-0. They will not rest on their laurels with the series in the bag and, if achieved, it would be very special to this group of players and coaches.
For the Lions, winning the series is always the No 1 priority. The uniqueness of Lions tours is that each one has its own characteristics; in terms of the context before travelling and how the journey then evolves. No two tours are ever the same; each one is different. Every tour is a different challenge. Sometimes, it is impossible to recognise that unless you have been in it. Everything is quite personal to the specific playing group and it reflects their approach. This year, the Lions have not had the same calibre of opposition coming right through the tour but, as Australia nearly proved in the second Test, if the tourists are not on their game, they will not win the third Test. They have to go to Sydney with a renewed focus of intent.
That was how we approached it in 1997. Even though we lost that third Test in Johannesburg, there was a real ambition to go and win the series 3-0. Even if we had been able to celebrate for a week, we wouldn't have.
We celebrated well on the night of the second Test in Durban. Some of the players spent most of the night on the braais (barbecues) in the car park with the South Africans. Some slept on the beach so they only got back to the hotel for breakfast. They had a good celebration.
But one of the reasons why comparisons between Lions tours is difficult is that the scheduling is so different. Even with hindsight, I would not change much about that week. We had given the Test XV as much rest and recovery as possible, but the injuries meant that there were players who would be playing two games in that final week. With one training day under our belts, four days later we were in the Test arena once again, for the third Test. In the end South Africa's desperation not to lose every Test gave them the edge, but there was huge satisfaction for all of us in the Lions' group when Martin Johnson raised the Test trophy above his head at the end of the game.
And could you have imagined me telling Johnno that he needed a rest ahead of that third Test? I would not have been able to stop him from playing – he would have put a jersey on no matter what.
It's so different to how it works now. Player welfare and recovery has moved on for the better but one challenge that Farrell has had has been, with fewer matches and less preparation time, allowing combinations and partnerships from different nations to mature and grow. He has had to do what we did but at ultra-speed. Players need time to grow in a Lions environment; to build relationships – on and off the field – and that takes time. It shows what a good job Farrell has done, in building that core togetherness, which is critical to Lions success.
Another issue that hovered in the background of the final week in South Africa was the fact that after the third Test a good number of England players had to be on a plane on the Sunday morning to fly to Australia for a Test against the Wallabies. An incredible request from the Rugby Football Union. That's how amateurish some of the thinking was at the time. Our players had given everything in that Test series. Tim Stimpson, Nick Beal, John Bentley, Mike Catt, Matt Dawson, Graham Rowntree, Mark Regan, Nigel Redman, Shaw, Richard Hill, Lawrence Dallaglio and Tim Rodber – all Lions and a week later they were starting for England in Sydney.
Interestingly, the bookmakers had strong odds on a 3-0 Test win for South Africa. Amazingly, the initial contracts for the players said that they'd only get a bonus for winning all three Tests. Fran Cotton, the tour manager, managed to persuade the committee men that the challenge was to win the series and that's where the value was. The committee structures of rugby still at that time still had an amateur viewpoint. Thankfully, Fran succeeded.
Andrew Goodman, one of Farrell's assistant coaches, this week cited the 1974 tour as the last time a side went through a Test series unbeaten and how the current crop were hoping to replicate that.
That tour was so different – as is the sport – to anything the players have to take on now, but we never really spoke about a clean sweep in 1974. The third Test was the hardest game of rugby I ever played in my life, but the whole thing on that tour was that no one wanted to be wearing the jersey in the first losing team on that trip. That was the intention the whole way through, and over the four Tests there were only two changes to the starting XV, something that stayed with me; the Lions' environment is made by the non-Test players, they are special Lions indeed.
While comparisons are futile, that is one parallel which the Lions can channel in Sydney this weekend. To go nine games unbeaten in Australia would be an achievement of which we could all be proud.