BOOK OF THE DAY: JOHN O'DONNELLreviews Once Were Lionsby Jeff Connor and Martin Hannan Harper Sport 369pp, £18.99
DESPITE GRIM predictions of extinction, the concept of a touring party to the southern hemisphere made up of the best rugby players from these islands has not only survived but has embraced the professional era.
They may sometimes take a hammering as a team, but as a brand the Lions are unbeatable. Thousands will don the replica shirt this summer; millions more will watch on television as they return to South Africa, where Nelson Mandela cheered them on from a blacks-only stand in 1955.
Their exotic blend of flamboyance and valour on and off the field (many of the early Lions became war heroes) has endeared them to supporters at home and intrigued fans overseas.
But if Lions past and present have been exemplars of skill and courage, the same cannot always be said of the administration, who justly earn the scorn of the authors of this timely work.
The zealous protection of the amateur ethos of the game by “the blazers” would be almost touching if it were not so unsympathetic. At a time when tours lasted five months, the treatment of players (often on unpaid leave) was scandalous.
The 1955 Lions were forced to sell their complimentary match tickets to supplement their five shillings (32 cents) daily pocket money. The 1966 tour manager, Des O’Brien, had to beg the committee for extra grey flannel trousers for players – which the committee then made them hand back when the tour ended.
On the same trip, the team were provided with a Saipan-like airstrip to train on but had to scamper for the hangars every time a plane took off or landed; hardly ideal preparation for facing the All Blacks.
Unsurprisingly, many players after touring turned to rugby league (and were then cast into outer darkness by the unions). Even Irish fans might have some sympathy for Wade Dooley, who in 1993 returned home from New Zealand for his father’s funeral, but was refused permission by the blazers to fly back out to play.
Such insensitive treatment naturally makes for an unhappy (and losing) camp.
There has been some improvement in subsequent years; the enemy may now be an occasionally hostile foreign press, though the inclusion of Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s spin- doctor, in the 2005 tour to New Zealand was surely one of the worst Lions selections ever.
As well as recounting famous matches, the book sometimes breaches the omerta surrounding off-pitch activities. We learn how Irish tourists Ronnie Lamont and Willie John McBride trashed a hotel, careering through corridors on a horse and a bicycle.
Players visiting South Africa in the past were warned not to consort with black women. The Welsh player Don Hayward found romance one night in Dunedin during the 1950 New Zealand trip. Forty-three years later a woman knocked on his door: “I think I may be your daughter” (she was), giving a new meaning to the phrase “what goes on tour, stays on tour”. There are reports of players mysteriously disappearing for days on end.
It’s hard not to giggle at the description of Will Carling in 1993, sulking after being dropped and asking if he could go home.
There are a couple of dropped balls. The authors gratingly refer to capped players as “internationalists”. Malcolm O’Kelly is listed as a club player in the 2001 Lions, although by then he had 30 caps. But these are quibbles.
The authors’ enthusiasm for the idea – and the ideals – of the Lions is sometimes breathless but ultimately hard to resist.
John O’Donnell is a poet, a barrister and an ecstatic Ireland (and Leinster) rugby fan