It was Hugo Keenan’s 80th-minute try that sealed the series but it was Tom Curry’s final play of his day, in the 55th minute, that enabled the British & Irish Lions to stay close enough to a rejuvenated Australia to pinch the second Test. There is so much written and spoken about the Sale Sharks and England flanker that occasionally you wonder if it can all be true.
Some doubted Curry’s credentials to wear the No7 shirt in this series but he scorched through his Test-match total of 111 minutes from start to finish. Andy Farrell, the head coach, described the English Lion as a machine but that’s not right. Machines don’t possess hearts and Curry has one of the biggest of hearts this game has seen.
In the vast MCG he looked to be running out of steam, almost paused on the halfway line as the Wallabies launched an attack in the crucial 55th minute. My eyes quickly switched from the lurching Curry to the Australian ball-carriers: the fresh replacement, Langi Gleeson, and Curry’s metronomic opposite number, Fraser McReight.
McReight was swerving infield, in search of the Wallaby wonder man, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii. The centre had already ignited the match with one of its most memorable moments, leaving Bundee Aki for dead with a step off his left foot — while Curry was chugging away nearby, hopelessly outpaced — before delivering a tryscoring pass to the magnificent full back, Tom Wright.
Curry goes into overdrive to topple Suaalii in a match-turning moment
That was in the 27th minute as Australia were racing into a commanding 18-point lead. Advance the match clock to 55 minutes and the home team were nine points ahead. Suaalii received the pass and straightened up. The Lions had one defender fixed in no man’s land between Suaalii and Tate McDermott — the bundle of dynamite — splendidly free on the left wing. The centre had the skills to make the tryscoring pass, McDermott the pace to race in unopposed. The only question was how close he would get to the posts to make it an easier conversion for the courageous Tom Lynagh.
But Curry sensed the situation. The stooped trot on the halfway line inexorably developed into an ever more committed sprint. You don’t give up a cause, even when everyone else might think it lost. He lunged at the centre from behind, forcing the knock-on before the league convert could pass McDermott over for a try and Australia into a 14 or 16-point lead, dependent upon the kick. Suaalii is simply too classy a rugby player to have wasted the chance.
What added another edge of significance to the match-turning millisecond was the penalty kicked by Lynagh, Australia’s cool fly half, just one minute earlier. The Lions’ fine fightback in the latter stages of the first half was in danger of being nullified. Australia’s 23-17 lead at half-time had already sneaked up to 26-17 and if Curry could not find that overdrive for the tackle, it was potentially a 16-point margin — and with it would come Australia’s second wind and another surge of self-belief.
Curry celebrates with family and friends at the MCG
TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER MARC ASPLAND
Anyone who has played the game will know that these sort of adrenaline bursts carry teams and individuals to places they have never been, where logic rarely trespasses. We’ll never know whether the Wallabies would have withstood the Lions but there’s no doubt they would have found more confidence and belief to go with their unquestionably heroic commitment. As the clock had passed the 79-minute mark when Keenan scrambled his way into Lions folklore, it is fair to suggest the Curry tackle was the difference between 1-1 and a 2-0 Lions series lead.
The huge-hearted flanker’s timing of interventions was terrific. After Wright had put Joe Schmidt’s team 23-5 ahead, it was Curry in the 34th minute, masquerading as a wing, who took advantage of sharp Lions work on the short side to keep them within range. He scored from the touchline in the first Test but the context of this try, where he neatly sidestepped, Shane Williams-like, inside the cover added an extra layer of importance to this one.
Curry left an indelible mark on both Melbourne and the series. In the first Test he and Tadhg Beirne combined to clatter the Australian pack from the very first kick. It was the physical statement of intent that sent them surging into a first-half lead that even second-half mediocrity could not throw away. And here he was — again — double tag-teaming with the Irish blind-side flanker to force a 36th-minute penalty from Harry Wilson, Australia’s captain and hard-running No8. It was mere minutes after Curry’s try, the Lions roared. The little bits and pieces were beginning to go their way.
Up stepped Finn Russell to drive a dagger into the heart of the home side with as perfect a penalty kick to within five metres of the tryline as is imaginable. The red shirts camped close to the line until Huw Jones crossed. It was a touch of swaggering genius from the Scot but brains, brawn and sheer will from the two flankers created the opportunity for our hero to take centre stage again.
Five minutes after Curry had left the field, Beirne’s 59th-minute try set up the blockbuster finale
TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER MARC ASPLAND
Beirne scored his own try, five minutes after his English mate was replaced, perfectly placed to receive the scoring pass from the powerful yet erratic James Lowe. Curry’s 54 minutes is the deserved stuff of headlines but the Irishman went the entire 160 minutes of two Tests without being replaced. Farrell described him pre-series as a big man for the big occasion. After a slow start to this tour he has proved himself a veritable Titan. Beirne was adjudged the official man of the match last week; he was hugely influential this week. Curry is the hero of the hour, the saviour of the second Test, but Beirne’s legend deserves to burn the brightest of the 2025 vintage.