Sydney is soaking, and the forecast is for more of the wet stuff on match day. Such a shame. I wanted to write a piece urging Finn Russell to release the shackles and show the world just how good he is.
It was the Scottish fly half who sent the British & Irish Lions on their way to what is already a series success with one game to go; the control he exercised with his boot, his soft hands and his exquisite, unforgettable pass for Sione Tuipulotu’s tenth-minute try in the opening Test. It will take something special in the third and final match to dislodge that as the moment of the 2025 series.
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But Russell will play what he sees. Within the broad framework of a team structure, he will gauge the situation of the game, the state of the opposition, the speed and quality of possession and the elements. On a warm evening, we could have expected Russell to deliver 80 minutes of kick/pass excellence to make us remember the attacking quality of the Lions and not the weakness of Australia.
This column has concentrated on the Lions fly half more than once. Irish readers, in particular, think Jamison Gibson-Park hasn’t received the credit he is due. In the main, his service has been slick and his kicking game has been good, especially in the first Test, but the scrum half has played to a pattern, a pre-match plan. The Lions have been dominant enough to stick to the plan. Good players can do this in their sleep and Gibson-Park is very good indeed.
Gibson-Park and Russell have been exceptional as a half-back partnership for the Lions, despite not starting together until the Queensland Reds game on July 2
DAN SHERIDAN/INPHO
Russell is different. For a start, he is the most misdiagnosed player of his generation. It has long been a case of love or loathe him (as a player), but even his best contemporaries — including Johnny Sexton, now a Lions coach — have been blinded against the Scot by what they see as the flash side of his game. In his Glasgow days, he steered his first professional club to the Pro 12 title in 2015. In the 75th minute of their semi-final against Ulster, he delivered one of those 20-metre Russell special passes to put DTH van der Merwe in at the corner to level the game.
Of course, he kicked the touchline conversion to win the match. Of course, he was mesmeric as they outclassed Munster in the final. He scored one of their four tries and converted them all. Ten years later, the Twickenham crowd saw him miss three kicks from three in the Six Nations and the anti-Russell crew were in their element. Never mind that he was by far the most accomplished player on the pitch. Talk grew about the “other” Fin — Smith — beating him to the Lions Test team.
Thereafter he barely missed a beat as he rediscovered his kicking boots to become Bath’s hero in the Gallagher Premiership final in June. In an era of coach control he should have been recognised as one of this era’s great heroes, but Russell remained a conundrum for many.
In 2019, Scotland fought back from a 24-point half-time deficit to draw with England 38-38 at Twickenham. England and their fly half, Owen Farrell, were majestic in the first half, Scotland a sorry mess with a game plan that went up in flames within 31 minutes as Jonny May touched down for England’s bonus-point try.
Russell, right, and Townsend had a well-publicised row at half-time in the England game in 2019, but it led to an unlikely revival
ANDY BUCHANAN/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
Russell famously had cross words with the Scotland head coach, Gregor Townsend, in the changing rooms. In the second half, he ripped England to pieces, playing the high-risk rugby of which only someone as technically adroit as the fly half was capable. England and Farrell, instead of tightening their game in the face of the fightback, continued as they were. Farrell stuck to coach’s plan; Russell looked up and changed everything.
The game went down as one of those Russell spells of genius, but he also displayed the capability to make the live calls on behalf of the team. Farrell has a reputation as the strategist and game controller, but Russell is the one with the vision and nerve to play it as he sees.
He might not strike every punt to perfection, but the key to a winning team is the quality of the decision-making. In the second Test in Melbourne, Russell threw a pass to the touch judge and shanked a punt out on the full. But when the game reached its white-hot denouement at the MCG, the fly half remained composed at the centre of the drive towards Australia’s line. Watch the last seconds again and see Russell’s left hand waving at the scrum half, towards Hugo Keenan and all that match-winning space. As 90,000-plus spectators were going crazy, Russell was the epitome of cool.
Russell’s ability to stay calm under pressure is one of his finest qualities
TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER MARC ASPLAND
If the weather forecast is correct, the chances of Russell finishing the tour with an added exclamation mark or two after his name are less likely. Percentages suggest that his calculating brain will opt for boot over hand, so we may not get the glorious finale to a brief Test career as a Lion. He will be 36 by the next tour, so the odds of a trip to New Zealand are against him, although given Russell’s class it’s perhaps worth a punt.
There was, let us not forget, 70 minutes off the bench against South Africa in the third Test decider in 2021. It was a cameo in which he tore up Warren Gatland’s Springbok imitation game plan and almost beat them. Alas, too many Lions were not on his wavelength. It was depressing but not surprising.
At Bath, Johann van Graan and Russell have met somewhere in the middle as far as a rugby philosophy goes, but it is the Scot who has the final say. Bath’s previous inflexibility has bowed to genius. When he wants the ball, you give it to him.
If Ellis Genge is Maro Itoje’s motivator down under, Russell is the captain’s scanning eyes and tactical brain. Here’s hoping for a break in the clouds and an opportunity for the Lions No10 to unload one or two seconds of instinctive genius to balance the percentage rugby that is part and parcel of a rainy day in Sydney. Russell as man of the match would be good for the game.