The sense of anticipation ahead of the first Test is in the warm Brisbane air. Two days out, both Joe Schmidt and Andy Farrell unveiled their matchday 23s, the swathes of red-clad supporters are beginning to descend upon the Queensland capital, and the families of the Lions players and backroom staff have been arriving in recent days.
Farrell hasn’t been shy about wandering from the team hotel to sample the atmosphere.
“I’ve loved it. If you just stay in your hotel you don’t get to feel it. And you become so cooped up you start to overthink all sorts of things,” he admitted. “It has been great that we get to this point of Test match football, all the families have started to arrive. There is a bit of normality there, being able to have a day off, go out for a meal, along the river.”
How can the depleted Wallabies survive a Lions onslaught?
This is a city where he described a win with Wigan over the Brisbane Broncos in 1994 as one of the highlights of his playing career. And, by chance, when walking the streets on Thursday morning he came across one of his old Broncos and Australian opponents, Gorden Tallis, now a pundit on Fox Sports.
READ MORE
“I actually saw him on the street. I went, ‘Gordy!’ He said: ‘Flipping heck’. So, we had a good 20 minutes chatting in the street and it was good to catch up with him.
“He said everyone used to talk about Queensland being underdogs. He said: ‘We never, ever saw it that way.’ And Australia will be exactly the same. It’s the same as us, as far as being favourites. It’s about your preparation and how you get down to performing and that’s all that matters.
“It’s something that we’ve talked about from day one. If you’re in a position where it comes down to this every 12 years and you get to pull the shirt on for the Wallabies and the privilege that goes with that, representing your country, they’ll be fighting tooth and nail, won’t they?”
Meanwhile, Schmidt is not disputing the underdog tag. He says he is “pragmatic” about an injury toll which has deprived the Wallabies of his go-to outhalf Noal Lolesio, Australia’s back-to-back player of the year and go-to ball carrier Rob Valetini, human wrecking ball Will Skelton and flanker Langi Gleeson.
The former Leinster and Ireland head coach said that Valetini (calf), Skelton (calf) and Gleeson (dead leg) were all “right on the edge” and had it been the last game of the series they would have been in the mix. He was confident that all would be fit for the second Test.
But whereas Farrell can call on vastly experienced alternatives in the absence of a trio of outside backs, Schmidt has been compelled to roll the dice. He has given a Test debut to the 29-year-old blindside flanker Nick Champion de Crespigny, who spent three years with Castres before returning to Australia to play with the Force this year. He will provide more of a lineout option and in the jackal than the ball carrying of Valetini.
Lolesio was making his 12th start in Schmidt’s 14 Tests as the Wallabies head coach against Fiji when suffering the neck injury which subsequently required surgery. Schmidt subsequently answered the clarion call to call up the one-time bad boy of Australian rugby James O’Connor into the squad.
Even so, he was widely expected to choose Lolesio’s understudy Ben Donaldson, but instead he has given a full Test debut to 22-year-old Tom Lynagh on his home ground after earning just three caps off the bench last year. This is particularly ironic as it has echoes of O’Connor being pitched in at outhalf for the first time in the Test series against the Lions 12 years ago.
Schmidt did reveal that Lynagh, whose father Michael was outhalf when the Lions recovered from losing the first Test to win the series in 1989, would have made a couple of starts last year but for slight injuries.
“I’m really excited for Tom. He’s a great kid. He’s got a quiet confidence about him,” Schmidt said. “You wouldn’t think that he’s necessarily designed to run a game and dictate what’s happening, but he does have a quiet confidence that gives us a quiet confidence as well.
“And he’s fitted in really well this week. He has given us the confidence, and the players the confidence, that he’s going to run the game really well for us. His kicking game is strong. He’s got good acceleration and he’s incredibly brave to a fault.”
He also provides more of a running threat than Donaldson, scoring four tries in his 104 points in 13 games for the Reds this season, and Lynagh’s familiarity with his home stadium was also a factor.
“It’s great for him but probably not ideal to be starting your first Test match for the Wallabies against the British and Irish Lions, but you’ve got to start somewhere and if not now, when? So now is good.”
AUSTRALIA: Tom Wright; Max Jorgensen, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii, Len Ikitau, Harry Potter; Tom Lynagh, Jake Gordon; James Slipper, Matt Faessler, Allan Ala’alatoa; Nick Frost, Jeremy Williams; Nick Champion de Crespigny, Fraser McReight, Harry Wilson (capt).
Replacements: Billy Pollard, Angus Bell, Tom Robertson, Tom Hooper, Carlo Tizzano, Tate McDermott, Ben Donaldson, Andrew Kellaway.
BRITISH AND ITRISH LIONS: Hugo Keenan (Ire); Tommy Freeman (Eng), Huw Jones (Sco), Sione Tuipulotu (Sco), James Lowe (Ire); Finn Russell (Sco), Jamison Gibson-Park (Ire); Ellis Genge (Eng), Dan Sheehan (Ire), Tadhg Furlong (Ire); Maro Itoje (Eng, capt), Joe McCarthy (Ire); Tadhg Beirne (Ire), Tom Curry (Eng), Jack Conan (Ire).
Replacements: Rónan Kelleher (Ire), Andrew Porter (Ire), Will Stuart (Eng), Ollie Chessum (Eng), Ben Earl (Eng), Alex Mitchell (Eng), Marcus Smith (Eng), Bundee Aki (Ire).
