Pretty much every British & Irish Lions tour leaves a rugby legacy. As well as being a commercial beast and something of a sporting phenomenon - four countries coming together once every four years to be supported by 40,000 people on the other side of the world, for heaven’s sakes - this “legacy” thing comes with the territory.
Ian McGeechan’s 1997 Lions revived the concept and gave the Lions its launching pad in the professional era. This was largely thanks to winning the series and the impact of the Living with Lions documentary. That show gave unprecedented access to the squad’s daily life and, with it, Jim Telfer’s legendary Lions speech.
The 2001 series in Australia was an epic, even if it ended in defeat to Rod MacQueen’s brilliantly reconstructed reigning world champions. It reaffirmed the Wallabies’ status as a superpower, but also proved inspiring for the core of the England side that would beat Australia in the World Cup final two years later.
Ironically, Clive Woodward dipped into the English well a little too deeply in 2005 when the Lions were blown away in New Zealand. That All Blacks side had not won the World Cup in 2003, when mugged by an inferior but inspired Australia in the semi-finals.
Nor would the All Blacks do so in 2007 when, again, they were mugged by inspired opposition. France were the opponents in that unforgettable quarter-final in Cardiff. Yet, as Ronan O’Gara recently said in The Irish Times, that was probably the best All Blacks side of the professional era. Dan Carter’s virtuoso 33-point performance in the second Test is the best by an outhalf in the professional era. Now, that’s some legacy.
The 2009 collision between a South African side that had conquered the world two years previously and a brilliant Lions side perhaps went beyond the line in its sheer physical brutality. But it was a true epic, managing to both reaffirm the Springboks as the leading side in the world and revive the Lions brand.
The Boks may have made changes after winning the first two Tests, but that win in the tour finale in Ellis Park under Paul O’Connell’s captaincy ended a run of seven successive Test losses.
Opposing captains Kieran Read of the All Blacks and Sam Warburton of the Lions lift the trophy following the drawn series in 2017. Photograph: David Rogers/Getty Images
The revival has continued too, with the Lions emphatically sealing a Test series win with that 41-16 victory over Australia in Sydney in 2013. There was huge merit in drawing a series from one-nil down in New Zealand in 2017, which strengthened the argument that northern hemisphere rugby was now punching on an equal footing with the giant southern counterparts.
True, the last two World Cups have remained the preserve of the Springboks but those aforementioned three Lions tours contributed to a narrowing of the gap between the two hemispheres - witness Ireland winning a series in New Zealand and drawing one in South Africa.