CONTENDERS FOR No 10 HIT CAMPAIGN TRAIL
FOUR years ago in Australia, there was no doubt about the Lions fly-half hierarchy. Johnny Sexton was lord and master, and Owen Farrell was rookie understudy. This time it is very different. Several thousand miles away from Downing Street, another close battle for No 10 is in prospect. The Irish contender is well aware that the landscape has shifted significantly since 2013 when he played 224 minutes of the Test series against the Wallabies, leaving Farrell to settle for a 16-minute cameo in Sydney with the clinching victory already sealed.
Sexton will go into today’s tour opener here against the New Zealand Provincial Barbarians desperate to capitalise on being handed the first playmaker audition on the basis that he is not the frontrunner now. The Leinster man has had a patchy, disrupted season while his English rival and friend has swept to new heights in successful club and Test teams.
Dan Biggar of Wales completes the cast of uber-competitive No 10s striving to claim that prized place in Warren Gatland’s Test side and the three-way tussle will be an absorbing sub-plot in the first three weeks of this daunting southern crusade. The popular perception is that it will end up being an Anglo-Irish duel for stand-off supremacy and the force is with Farrell.
He is now 25 and widely acclaimed as one of the pre-eminent players in the sport. Since the last Lions tour, he has won two Premierships and two Champions Cups with Saracens, not to mention two Six Nations titles including a Grand Slam, along with a series whitewash of Australia last June.
His own star has risen to the point that he was nominated for the world Player of the Year award last year and claimed the equivalent European honour last month.
In the same period, Sexton has endured an ill-fated stint in Paris with Racing 92 and a series of injury setbacks, including a number of concussions.
Despite inspiring Ireland to victory over the All Blacks last autumn, the 31-yearold senses that Farrell is the man with the strongest early claim for the role they both crave, unless he can play well enough to persuade the coaches to pick his rival at No 12, as Eddie Jones does for England.
Asked if earning selection ahead of Farrell was one of the biggest challenges he has ever faced, Sexton said: ‘I’d say so, yeah. He’s a world-class player. He’s had some great success over the last couple of years. I know what that feels like having had the same success with Leinster but probably four years previously. He’s coming in as favourite to start somewhere, so it will be up to me to try to prove that I can still play that role.’
After naming his team for today’s match, Gatland relayed an amusing story from pre-tour training in Maynooth, outside Dublin. The Lions head coach said: ‘It was quite funny last week at the end of the training, I just said I would have a chat to the 10s. Dan was there and Johnny was there, and Owen was over there and Johnny said, “Don’t worry about him, he’s a midfielder”.
‘There’s already a bit of banter and the players are very aware of the competition in that position so they’ll get a chance, the three of them, to start. Johnny starts on Saturday and then the other two will start the next two games.’
For many months, there was constant speculation about the possibility of a Sexton-Farrell 10-12 alliance in the Lions Test team, but that has given way to the expectation of a straight, three-sided fight for the right to occupy the coveted fly-half spot. It would aid Sexton’s cause if Farrell was shunted out one place, but he’s not counting on that convenient solution.
‘I’m not sure,’ he said, when asked if he thought the friends could join forces to good effect in the same back line. ‘You’d have to ask the coaches.
‘They haven’t given any hints that Owen will play there (12). Obviously he’s had some great success with England at 12 but also he’s had great success with Saracens at 10. I’ll get a chance on Saturday to play 10 and I’ve got to try and make a first impression.’
The Dubliner was a pivotal figure in Australia when Gatland’s squad claimed a first series triumph for 16 years, but that does not mean credit in the bank four years on. ‘It’s a clean slate,’ said Sexton.
Gatland is also insistent that Biggar is not merely out here for midweek duties, although the Welshman is destined to start on Wednesday against the Blues at Eden Park. ‘Knowing the three of them, they’re desperate to play and start in that position,’ he said.
The Lions are blessed to have three playmakers of such calibre. Sexton may be regarded as the most natural, flowing attacking fulcrum, but Farrell has vastly expanded his repertoire to supplement his goal-kicking and defensive prowess, while Biggar offers physicality and a supreme kick-and-catch party piece.
In Whangarei and Westminster, all the signs are that the battle for No 10 is no foregone conclusion.