The 1971 British and Irish Lions tour of New Zealand

John B said (asked) I thought Ken Donald scored a try for Qld? The Ian McLachlan (or however it is properly spelled) was the “Mighty Mouse” who gets referred to from time to time - about 14 stone (c90kg) wringing wet if you were lucky. How times change. I have an account of the tour, written by a crusty old Welshman Bryn Thomas who was on the tour's press party, which itemises all the scores. For the Queensland match he says that Queensland won by three penalties and two dropped goals to a goal (converted try) and two penalties. That was 15-11 by the scoring values of the time. You also alluded to the diminutive size of Mighty Mouse McLauchlan. The same book gives his 'Vital Statistics' as being 5ft in height (152cm) and 14st 6lb (202lbs / 91.8kg) in weight. Titchy, huh? Mind you, the awesomely huge (by the standards of the time) Willie John McBride was only 6ft 3in (190.5cm) and weighed a svelte 16st 12 lbs (236lbs / 107.3kg). Only Mike Roberts, a lock who they tried to convert to a prop because of the injury crisis, matched McBride in weight and although several players were taller than him, the lankiest being his second-row partner Gordon Brown at 6ft 5in (195.6cm) they were all, apart from Roberts, lighter than him. By today's standards, McLauchlan would have been a scrum half and McBride a crash-ball centre!

This part of the discussion reminds me of that oft repeated line about Wales - 'the Welsh have never actually been beaten at Cardiff Arms Park, it's just that occasionally the other team scores more points than they do!' Sorry

One of the greatest Lions sides that nobody ever talks about is the 1955 side to South Africa, whose creed was "open rugby, with all possession to be run directly regardless of quality." They drew the series, but the rugby produced 26 tries in four Tests. The 50s were a golden age for Lions rugby, despite never winning a series.

Jason, And if my auntie had a bollocks she'd be my uncle. :) That's true enough. But just for the interests of balance I would also have to point out that the Test series on the 1959 Lions Tour, which the All Blacks won by three tests to one, would also have been drawn under today's scoring, Primarily because in the first test, New Zealand won by 18 points to 17 in a match in which Don Clarke kicked six penalty goals to outscore FOUR tries by the Lions. The results of the other three tests would not have been affected by modern scoring values. I don't think there has ever been a greater travesty in international rugby than that. Certainly in the Five/Six Nations since the war at any rate, there has NEVER been a case when a team outscored the opposition by three tries, let alone four, and still lost.

Interestingly, under today's scoring system this is how the 1971 test series between the All Blacks & the Lions would've gone: FIRST TEST-Dunedin New Zealand 3 British & Irish Lions 11 SECOND TEST-Christchurch New Zealand 32 British & Irish Lions 16 THIRD TEST-Wellington New Zealand 5 Briitish & Irish Lions 17 FOURTH TEST-Auckland New Zealand 18 British & Irish Lions 16 So, under today's scoring system, the series would've been locked at 2-2.

Ohtani's jacket: I sort of agree with you but... While trying to refresh my memory after reading these threads I came across an article written by Willie John and he pointed out that prior to the 1st Test at Carisbrook he had played nine tests for the Lions and not been on the winning side once. That's why the '71 series was the most important for the Lions; for the first time in their history they won a series against one of the two best rugby playing nations.They proved to themselves that at long last they could do it. Three years later in South Africa with partly the same group of players they knew they were capable of doing it again. Willie John played in five Lions tours:'62, '66, '68, '71 & '74 - not bad eh!

The All Blacks loss to South Africa in 1970 and the Lions in '71 marked the end of New Zealand's dominance from the mid-50s to the end of the 60s, and I think it's fair to say that the '71 All Blacks side wasn't the greatest we ever fielded, even if we had the better of the Lions up front. A series victory in New Zealand is a series victory (only four sides have ever accomplished it), but I feel the South African tour was more difficult. The Boks hadn't played a lot of Test match rugby in the two years leading into the Lions tour, due to the apartheid situation, but touring SA in those days meant dealing with South African refs, phantom penalties, disallowed tries, skullduggery & headhunting. The series is famous for the 99 Call and Battle of Boet Erasmus, but I was always more impressed by the scrum training Millar put them through in Stilfontein.

When I was a kid watching rugby in the 1970s, the real enemy we all loved to hate were the Welsh. In truth, it was because they dominated the game in Europe in that decade with only France to challenge their supremacy. They were so hard to beat because they had so many good players that even if the team generally was having a bad day, one of them could step up to the mark, do the little bit extra that was needed and pull the game out of the fire. If not Edwards, then Gerald Davies. If not him then Phil Bennett, or JPR. Or maybe even some of the good players they had in the pack at the time like Mervyn Davies or Terry Cobner or any one of the famed Pontypool Front Row of Faulkner, Windsor and Price. With the core of the Lions backs made up of the Welsh team (only Mike Gibson of Ireland and occasionally David Duckham of England were interlopers in the test team) the Lions had the strike power to get out of difficulty when they needed to. The great irony, though, is that despite some scintillating displays in the provincial games like putting 47 points on Wellington (which would be more than 60 points in today's money) the Lions won the tests by keeping things tight and playing a largely 10 man game. In fact, the All Blacks outscored the Lions overall in the Tests in terms of tries. The Lions best test try came in the high-scoring second test which the All Blacks won comfortably. That was when a sweeping counter attack set Gerald Davies free to score in the corner. But elsewhere the tries tended to come from close quarter pressing work: McLachlan's in the first test came from charging down a clearance kick. The vital try in the last test came from an attacking line out. As has been pointed out, the Lions in the first test deliberately played to a perceived All Black weakness, that of the vulnerability of the aging Fergie McCormick to astute tactical kicking. With Barry John at out half they were able to execute that strategy to good effect. They probably COULD have won the tests playing a more expansive game and deciding that however many tries the All Blacks scored, they would be sure to score a few more. But perhaps because their pack could not dominate the All Blacks, but could instead attempt to gain some sort of parity, they played the safety first game and controlled rather than expanded their play in the tests.

Dublin Dave, Correctomundo. I threw the 'deliberate' mistake in there to see if everyone was paying attention. That's my excuse & I'm sticking to it!!!

To give you an idea just how strong Wales was in the '70's, have a look at the 1971 Lions squad. Players of the calibre like Barry John, Gareth Edwards, JPR Williams, Mike Roberts, Delme Thomas, Lions skipper John Dawes, John Taylor, Mervyn Davies. Those players would've made it into an World XV back in the 1970's.

Hold the front page! Sheek makes a fumble!! A slight error, Sheek, in your recounting of the 1971 Lions' front row problems. The replacement props were indeed from Scotland and Ireland: Ian "Mighty Mouse" McLachlan was at loose head but the replacement tight head was Sean Lynch, a pub owner from Dublin. Stack Stevens wasn't Irish. He was a West Country Wurzel from the south of England. He was indeed one of the replacement props flown out when Carmichael and McLoughlin were invalided off the tour but I don't think he played any of the tests. I guess "Stack" was short for haystack, because he was a big lad. And as his real first name was Claude, he was probably glad of any nickname!!

More memories! As Sheek says the Lions were bashed by Canterbury a week before the 1st test in Carisbrook.Carwyn wisely kept some key players out of the game because they expected trouble.Willie John McBride walked the touchline pleading to be let on the field "So I can sort the bastards out!". With mayhem on the field Carwyn sat in the stand as laconic as ever.He said to Barry John who was sitting next to him:"Fergie is interesting today, isn't he?" He realised that Carwyn was watching a different game! Fergie McCormick ,a key All Black who was the nemesis of the Welsh team who toured NZ in '69 ( he scored 24 points in one test).Carwyn had noticed that he was susceptible under the high ball and was slow to turn. One week later in the first test Barry John peppered Fergie with kicks over his head.The LIons won 9-3, after a heroic forward effort lead by Willie John who took over the pack leadership after Ray McLouglin was injured in Canterbury and the Mighty Mouse scored the only try of the game.( Sean Lynch was the other prop Sheek) Fergie never played for the All Blacks again.

What made the series win by the Lions back in 1971 even more emphatic was the fact that as I mentioned before in my article, that Dr Doug James who was the manager of the 1971 Lions squad and had also toured withe Lions as a player back in 1950, had predicted at the start of the tour that the Lions would win the series against the All Blacks 2-1 with 1 test drawn. Bear in mind that up to this point no Lions side had ever beaten the All Blacks on NZ soil, and that in Test matches draws only occur perhaps once in every 20 matches, it seemed a highly unlikely outcome, and remember the All Blacks rarely lose a Test series at home up to this point.

Jason, I would argue that the 74 Lions were a better side than the '71 Lions, although both sides had some awesome players, with some brilliant backs. However in 74, the Lions series victory was emphatic, and they did not lose a test match. The '74 Lions finally eroded the myth of Springbok forwards being superhumans. The All Blacks had not won a test series in SA at that stage, indeed the only side that had won were the French in the 1950s.

The impact and legacy of the 71 Lions wasn't just the fact that they won their first ever series against NZ but how they revolutionised the way the game was being played in NZ at the time as well as advocating the round the corner kicking style practised by Barry John. The running of the British backs and their 15 man game had an enormous impact on NZ provincial rugby. Wellington in particular was one of the strongest unions at the time but suffered a 47-9 thrashing and it was the first time that Carwyn James showed his hand ahead of the first test by playing his strongest lineup and as captain John Dawes was quoted "It was the best and most complete performance we ever gave, the day it all came together". Wellington learnt those lessons well and adopted the Lions entertaining approach which was helped with players like John Duggan, Mark Sayers, Grant Batty and Joe Karam in their backline. The 1970's was the period in their history when British rugby was at its strongest and I agree with Sheek, a combination of the players from the 1971 and 1974 touring sides would qualify many of those players as their greatest ever. Certainly Ian Kirkpatrick's try in the second test at Christchurch where he swatted off tacklers in a 55 metre run swapping the ball from one arm to the next ranks as one of NZ's best ever individual tries.

JohnB, From my archives (if I recall), Ken Donald did make a comeback in 1970, but the following year had retired again. Qld kicked 3 penalties & 2 drops to 2 tries, a con & 2 pens. The Qld captain was Barry Honan, younger brother to dual international Bobby (Ws 64, Ks 69), who was with Souths Rabbitohs at the time. Unfortunately, Honan did his knee soon after & missed the tests. It was a sad end to a good career. He was only 24. There's a wonderful photo of the Honan brothers meeting at Sydney airport in 1969. Bobby Honan is on his way to NZ with the Kangaroos, while Barry Honan is on his way to SA with the Wallabies.

Jason Cave - the 2005 Lions didn't play against the Crusaders/Hurricanes etc, they played provincial teams like Wellington, Bay of Plenty, Otago, Manawatu etc.

And the reason why I say it's possibly the greatest Lions side of all time, was because before the professional rugby era began, not too many teams in the '70s could beat, let alone win, against the All Blacks (with the exception of the Springboks) on NZ soil. Yet this Lions team did. Also instead of facing teams like in today's era-the Crusaders, the Highlanders etc-the Lions played against sides like Auckland, NZ Universities, Counties, NZ Maori, Wellington, Bay of Plenty-and every one of those players not only pumped themselves up at the prospect of playing against the Lions, they also knew that one good, or even better, performance would lead to an All Black jersey.

I thought Ken Donald scored a try for Qld? The Ian McLachlan (or however it is properly spelled) was the "Mighty Mouse" who gets referred to from time to time - about 14 stone (c90kg) wringing wet if you were lucky. How times change.

Another interesting thing is that first choice props Ray McLoughlin(I) & Sandy Carmichael(S) were bashed before the first test, & both missed the entire series. They were replaced by fellow countrymen Ian McLauchlan(S) & Stack Stevens(I). Either way, there was an Irishman & Scotsman in the frontrow. In a previous post I mentioned how it is often said if you added the 71 backs to the 74 forwards, you would have the ultimate Lions team. The Lions began their tour with a 11-15 loss to Queensland, although they scored the only 2 tries (value 3 points). The next game they beat NSW 14-12 (again 2 tries to none), before beginning their wonderful leg in NZ.