@Caolan_Scully A great development for rugby. No more closed shop tours. Fairness and sporting consequences. Although not perfect, itโs a step forward and a improvement
@DarraghOBrienTD Will you ever announce any extra trains from Adamstown into the city? Small trains are jammed every morning. Itโs unsafe and getting worse.
@slatterywill Itโs a bit of a emergency for Ireland at this stage. Farrell out, ROG in, should be explored as an option/ Ireland not on the right path at the moment.
It is still worth noting what an overhyped achievement ๐ฆ Lions winning a test series in ๐ฆ๐บ Australia is.
๐ด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ England won 3-0 there in 2016 by clearer margins vs an ๐ฆ๐บ Australia ranked top 4 in the world at the time having won 7 of their last 9 games vs Tier 1 the year before and the only losses against an All Blacks side that was the greatest team in modern rugby history.
Lions this year by contrast faced an opponent who have won just 3 of their last 10 games vs Tier 1 which included comprehensive back to back home losses to a rotating ๐ฟ๐ฆ South Africa (aggregate score in those two games was 63-19 despite Boks making 11 changes for the second game) and nightmarishly shipping 67 away to ๐ฆ๐ท Argentina. In their most recent match they barely beat ๐ซ๐ฏ Fiji at home.
In addition to that ๐ฆ๐บ Australia lost a 3 match series at home to ๐ด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ England in 2022 at home 2-1. That Aussie team was coming off a poor November but had beaten ๐ฟ๐ฆ South Africa twice the year before to come 2nd in the TRC so still in better form than this Wallabies side. Yet rather than being hyped and celebrated as a great achievement that England series win carried so little weight they sacked their coach just two losses later.
๐ฎ๐ช Ireland also won a 3 match series there 2-1 in 2018. So of the four 3 match test series ๐ฆ๐บ Australia have played in the last decade the only series win was 2-1 over a much depleted ๐ซ๐ท France who handed out 13 debuts on that tour and still should have won but for a farcical failure to kick the ball out on full time in the 1st test.
Yet here we have the Lions comprising of ๐ฎ๐ช Ireland (who on their own have won 6 of their last 7 vs Australia), ๐ด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ England (who on their own have won 10 of their last 12 vs Australia), & ๐ด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ณ๓ ฃ๓ ด๓ ฟ Scotland (who on their own have won 4 of their last 5 vs Australia) joining together to beat ๐ฆ๐บ Australia by the barest of margins in the last minute and celebrating like they won a World Cup.
In reality 3-0 ought to be bare minimum expectation for the Lions on this tour, anything less is an embarrassment, and an 11 point aggregate margin after two games really isn't that impressive at all and probably below par (not to forget they couldn't even beat a far from full strength ๐ฆ๐ท Argentina and fielding virtually the test team looked dreadful vs Brumbies team missing all their best players).
Yet there are headlines such as "Andy Farrellโs victorious Lions stand on the verge of all-time greatness". Sorry, but that is total bollocks. This Lions team and this tour is quite possibly the most OVERHYPED and OVERRATED in rugby history.
Frankly the players ought to embarrassed celebrating like they'd climbed Rugby Everest squeaking to a win vs an opponent with 3 wins in their last 10 Tier 1 matches as part of a combined force including three who have beaten them multiple times already and all four Unions have bigger budgets. Imagine if ๐ณ๐ฟ New Zealand, ๐ฆ๐บ Australia, ๐ซ๐ฏ Fiji all pooled together as an Oceania XV to beat say ๐ฆ๐ท Argentina how ludicrous it would look to trumpet that as a great achievement. Yet that isn't far off the equivalent of what the Lions hype machine is doing here.
@RuaidhriOC Why would there be an atmosphere. It is a multi country international side vs a mid table club side on a Wednesday night in winter. There is next to nothing at stake. No ingredients for the fans to create an atmosphere.
Customers: if your booking is a flexible ticket, and circumstances change, you can cancel and get a full refund ๐ซฃ #toosoon? ๐ข๐ต #hurling
https://t.co/SvHa0Faday
@IrishRugby@lionsofficial Disgraceful pricing for a novelty friendly after spending two years pushing lions membership to get access to buy tickets. Lions fans getting smaller in numbers every four years. Appreciate it means a lot to the players but fans disillusioned. Bring on July 5th & 12th ๐ฌ๐ช ๐ต๐น