Farrell urges Lions to tour
hplayers ready to follow any protocols to ‘make it happen’ Option to host South Africa unlikely as pandemic continues
England captain Owen Farrell and his three counterparts in the home nations are understood to have told British and Irish Lions officials that the series against South Africa this summer “must go ahead” – even if matches have to be played behind closed doors. The eight-match tour has been plunged into doubt because of the pandemic.
England captain Owen Farrell is understood to have joined forces with Celtic counterparts Johnny Sexton, Alun Wyn Jones and Stuart Hogg to urge British and Irish Lions officials to ensure that the series against South Africa “must go ahead” – even if it has to be played behind closed doors.
The Daily Telegraph can reveal that Farrell and his fellow captains held a conference call last week and gave a direct instruction to the Lions to “make the tour happen”, insisting that the players would adapt to any scenario to ensure it was not cancelled.
A source said: “The message was clear, the four captains told Lions officials, ‘We don’t care where, we don’t care how, please make it happen. The players are desperate for it to go ahead’ .”
The Lions board is to meet on Friday to continue discussions about how the eight-match tour can go ahead in July and August, amid concerns that travelling supporters would be unlikely to be allowed to attend and that matches may have to be played behind closed doors because of the pandemic.
It is understood that contingency plans to host the “tour” in the UK and Ireland are fading fast, because of the forecast for continuing lockdown restrictions, with the senior players’ intervention making a tour of South Africa behind closed doors now the most likely outcome.
“It seems to be boiling down to sticking to the original schedule and playing the tour behind closed doors,” said another source.
“The fact that the players are keen to play whatever the circumstances is significant.”
The “home tour” proposal, which includes playing the three Test matches against the Springboks at Twickenham, the Principality Stadium in Cardiff and the Aviva Stadium in Dublin, has been fully costed and is forecast to generate greater revenues than the original tour – but only if Covid restrictions are relaxed and capacity crowds are permitted to attend.
Without capacity crowds, however, the plan would become a financial risk, given the amount of money required to make it happen, and there is now dwindling hope this will be possible.
Former players, including former Lions captain Willie John Mcbride, have also opposed this option, as they claim it would be against the heritage and ethos of the Lions.
With the option of postponing the tour to next year also unlikely, given the potential impact it could have on national sides as they make their preparations for the 2023 World Cup and the need to reorganise a number of the scheduled tours that summer, there is an increasing fear that the tour may have to be cancelled outright.
However, a tour without supporters would still be more financially attractive than cancellation, given that the broadcast income for the tour, for both the Lions and the South African Rugby Union, is still the largest single revenue stream for both parties, while sponsorship income would be unaffected.
Rory Best, the former Ireland captain who also captained the midweek Lions side on the tours of Australia and New Zealand in 2013 and 2017 respectively, said last week that pushing ahead with the tour as scheduled was the best option for the players if postponement was not an option, even if it meant the matches would be played behind closed doors.
“You would still have the atmosphere of being on tour and in a different country and everything that brings and also there are cultural things you can do,” Best said.
Rassie Erasmus, South Africa’s director of rugby, said on Monday that the Springboks would consider every possible option in order to face the Lions.
Erasmus said he “desperately” hoped the Lions tour would go ahead as scheduled.
“We desperately want to play the Lions, and we will do anything to play them,” he said.
“This series only comes around every 12 years. I have heard the different opinions about the tour, and although we didn’t play in the Rugby Championship because of player welfare, it was also because we knew there was this big series in 2021.”
Meanwhile, Warren Gatland, the Lions head coach, is due to arrive in the UK next week from New Zealand to enable him to watch the Six Nations matches live.
Announcements about his coaching assistants have been delayed, although England coach Eddie Jones revealed in December that Gatland had been in touch with the Rugby Football Union about the availability of England forwards coach Matt Proudfoot and defence coach John Mitchell for the tour.