The Lions are a scratch side playing a Boks team – most of whom have been playing together for the best part of two years. As to the individual quality of the players, someone asked a good question earlier. Which of the Lions squad would you want to have in your national team/squad? If memory serves, I think O’Driscoll is the only one ever mentioned before the tour started as who might get a spot on the bench.

He did give a good account of himself, but that’s hardly surprising, considering that Tendai and John had a sponge trapped between them. Sheridan is also a stronger scrummager than Jenkins.

“The Beast is hugely overrated, what has he actually done apart from boring in, in the first and third tests?”

Tackle, tackle, tackle.

“If I was a Boks fans I would be concerned about the depth of talent as essentially a scratch side came together and made some of the Boks look very average.”

Though I don’t disagree with your assertion about depth, that’s hardly the most complementary way of describing a team hand picked from the best of four supposedly first tier rugby nations.

However, both Flutey and Bowe stood up to the plate and were excellent. Since coming to England, Flutey’s improved his defence immensely.

I personally thought South Africa gave all they got, but didn’t play their best. Brussow was excellent and will become one of the best opensides of his generation IMO. I think most South Africa supporters wanted that back-row that played yesterday anyway, especially with Spies flattering to decieve. The same goes for the centre partnership, as both were the in form centres in the super 14, and perceived by many to be the prefered option.

The obvious weakness was in the back three, but many fans wanted a natural full-back instead of Steyn. But, the two wingers certainly are no way near the quality of Habana and Pieterson at the moment. Muller isn’t a patch on Botha and neither was the hooker on Du Plessis.

British & Irish Lions rugby is ‘festival rugby’ complete with a ‘licence to thrill’ !

Independent observers you say. Ha, ha…

I’d say independent experts 100 years from now will revisit the Lions 2009 tour with words to this effect:

‘South Africa beat the worlds greatest rugby circus in 2009 by effectively evolving to the game type – testimony to South Africa’s dynamism, a trademark which won the Springboks the Rugby World Cup twice circa the turn of the 21st century’

Sorry but the majority of the independent observers would say that throughout the series the better and more exciting rugby was played by the Lions. They played it in the right spirit and in spite of losing the series they can hold their head high. For the players and supporters it has been a wonderful tour. It is a pity that the majority of the players will never play together again, unless possibly in a Baa-baas shirt.

If I was a Boks fans I would be concerned about the depth of talent as essentially a scratch side came together and made some of the Boks look very average. I don’t accept the argument the Boks were undercooked the majority of the side has been together since before 2007 and it was the coaches decision to exclude the players from warm up games against the Lions. The Lions for their part, played three very different sides and made mistakes in selection through lack of time together and paid the price in two out of six halves of rugby. yet in the remaining four played the Boks off the park. I see that Geech is calling for the Lions tour to Oz to be longer to allow for more preparation before the tests.

I don’t know why there is continued insistence that the Boks were going to trample the Lions. Based on what? The Boks hadn’t played for ages, and other than the Bulls S14 win, the other SA teams had ended quite poorly in the S14, whereas the Lions member nations had come from a very good Six Nations showing and I for one never expected any games to be a Bok trampling.

Luck may have been a factor, but that’s the way the game goes. Just a pity the Boks didn’t show up for the third game. Very unprofessional. An opportunity to make history thrown away. Very disappointed.

The form of either team is hard to pick as one team has had over a third of its starting 15 missing for the whole international season to date and at times over half it’s top players. The Wallabies have strung together some very average performances also and any rugby person in there right mind would know that the French were not the same team that played against the All Blacks.

The Springboks were up there but I believe there is still more to come from the boys in green. However the Lions tour and June tests aside the Tri-Nations is a totally different kettle of fish. Rivalries are not something to be taken lightly and the SANZAR nations have the fiercest of them all and the quality of rugby in the southern climes is second to none.
There’s a reason why SA, NZ and Aus fill places 1 thru 3 in the world rankings