THE Lions beat the Wallabies in Saturday's Third and final Test in Sydney and thereby recorded their first series win in 16-years. It would be churlish not to congratulate the side on their victory. They won, they won well, but, only two cheers from me I am afraid. Because, I fear if winning ugly is to be the way of things for the Lions, count me out.
The Lions ought to be about more than simply winning a series. Let's face it, rugby's ultimate stage is the Rugby World Cup; and, on that stage, in six of the seven stagings, the winning side has been from the Southern Hemisphere. Therefore, generally, Southern Hemisphere rugby is superior to the Northern Hemisphere variety. Indeed, taking the RWC as the yardstick, the Northern Hemisphere nation which has consistently offered the greatest challenge to the SH Big Three of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa has been France.
The French do not contribute to the Lions, so, if, as has been the case on the Tour which has just ended in victory - it is all about winning. This is the subliminal message from North to South: OK, in the BIG event, the RWC, we four British Isles countries cannot consistently compete with you, so, we will combine and beat you then - thereby proving, our brand of rugby is superior.
This is clearly tosh. Over the three-match series in Australia, the home country, allegedly the weakest of the SH Big Three, should have won the First Test; did win the Second, then fell apart in the Third.
The reason for their Final Test failure was: the Lions scrum dominated; so, international rugby now, apparently, comes down to winning the scrummage battle. But, the consensus is, on Saturday, French referee Mr Poite decided the Lions had the stronger scrummage and favoured them.
Maybe they did; however, when winning a test match comes down to persuading the referee that your scrum is the stronger, we might as well pack it in and go home. There has long been this myth about scrummage power. Certainly, it helps, but, a scrum is simply supposed to be a means of re-starting play after a breakdown, not a weapon in winning games and the quicker we get back to basics and, again make it a means of restarting play, the better for rugby.
The scrum has been a mess for some years now. Hookers no longer hook, scrum-halves lang syne stopped feeding the ball down the middle of the tunnel, as per the laws. We have this ludicrous macho thing: "the hit".
Until the IRB truly grasps the nettle and sorts-out the scrum, the game will struggle. Similarly, "the breakdown" has to be sorted out.
THE IRB MUST, MUST, MUST BRING BACK "PROPER" RUCKING, IF THE GAME IS TO GO FORWARD.
I can appreciate we HAVE TO ensure that stamping and head-kicking is eliminated; thankfully, the players today are now more-stringently policed than ever before, however, as James Horwill proved in the Second Test, you can still, with a good lawyer, get away with a stamp. But, absolutely nothing ensures an entertaining, handling, off-loading game like quick ruck ball and the sooner we outlaw this scrambling about on the ground for the ball and go back to good, old-fashioned Otago or Scottish-style rucking, the better.
The Lions won the series through playing a limited, power-based game and with the help of the referee. A game where refereeing interpretations and safety-first boring bump and grind play wins, is a game with a problem.
Can I say, I am disgusted by my rugby-writing colleagues who are already insisting that Warren Gatland should coach the 2017 Lions in New Zealand.
Nay, nay and thrice nay - unless he is prepared, in the interim, to embrace a more-entertaining, backs and skill-orientated form of rugby than he preaches with Wales and encouraged the Lions to play.
Let's see the four British Isles nations giving it a real go in the 2015 RWC, then getting their entertainers and runners together to strut their stuff in the Land of the Long White Cloud two years later.
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