The British and Irish Lions tour kicked off last night in Dublin with a non-capped game against Argentina that saw Argentina win 28-24. The Lions played Argentina 20 years on from a game in Cardiff that ended 25 all in 2005.
That tour was led by Clive Woodward and won’t be well remembered by many. The loss last night has defiantly given the Lions coaches plenty to work through as they head for Australia. Defence, line outs and ball handling in and out of contact will be foremost in the minds as several times last night in attacking positions as well as open play was a big issue.
For the most part, last night’s 23 has been in camp for two weeks and they will be annoyed with some of the work in defence and missing out on one or two scoring opportunities. From an Argentina perspective they will be delighted with their work in attack from turnovers in particular where they manged to expose the Lions a few times out wide where Duhan Van Der Merwe and Marcus Smith missed key tackles.
The occasion in Dublin last night was fantastic and the atmosphere was very good from the start of the game through to minute 80.
Many times, we have heard that the Lions haven’t been tested for large periods of previous tours but that certainly wasn’t the case last night. They have seen the standard that will be required to beat Australia on home soil over the next 6 weeks.
The Lions will play Western Force next Saturday in game 1 and they will make a few changes to the 23. For the first time in a while by the second game of a tour all bar one of the squad namely Blair Kinghorn will have seen game time either from the off or from the bench. That should help cohesion as the weeks go by and the three games vs Australia come into view…
The Lions will review and acclimatise over the coming days while preparing for the game next week. Farrell and his coaches know that the pressure will increase in particular after the defeat in Dublin.
Some of the attacking play that did stick for The Lions was good and will have pleased Andrew Goodman who is the backs coach alongside Richard Wigglesworth and Jonathan Sexton who will have their hand prints all over the work in attack over the next few weeks.
Let’s hope its evolution in attacking terms because the one team you need to have a clear attack plan against would be Australia who are slowly beginning to kick into gear after beating England last November as well as running Ireland very close in Dublin.
Joe Schmidt will know the Lions coaches very well as he gave many of them a start within the Irish set up during his 6 years as head coach. Himself, Les Kiss and Laurie Fisher will be planning to push the Lions all the way during the upcoming series.
The tour kicks off on Australian soil next Saturday with an 11am kick off against Western Force. All the best to all the players and coaches……