{"id":284759,"date":"2025-07-23T08:38:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-23T08:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/284759\/"},"modified":"2025-07-23T08:38:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-23T08:38:09","slug":"lions-great-names-surprise-country-as-ideal-future-tour-destination-planet-rugby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/284759\/","title":{"rendered":"Lions great names surprise country as \u2018ideal\u2019 future tour destination : Planet Rugby"},"content":{"rendered":"

A British and Irish Lions great has named a surprise destination for a future trip amid calls for Australia to be taken off the tour roster. The Lions\u2019 current schedule across 12 years consists of visits to Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.<\/strong><\/p>\n

However, so underwhelming is the level of opposition on the latest 2025 tour, Brian Moore, a Test series winner against the Wallabies in 1989, has called for a change and for the Lions to tour somewhere else in 2037.<\/p>\n

The Lions are set to visit New Zealand in 2029 and South Africa in 2033, but ex-England hooker Moore wants a different destination to be stitched into the calendar for the next trip.<\/p>\n

His call follows the underwhelming level of opposition provided by the low ebb Wallabies, who were comfortably defeated in last Saturday\u2019s Test series opener. The low standard of the provincial opposition provided in recent weeks by Australia\u2019s Super Rugby Pacific teams has also been roundly criticised.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of this is straightforward\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Writing in The Telegraph<\/a>, Moore claimed that the US Eagles<\/a> would be ideal future opponents \u2013 if they improved.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am aware from speaking to several Lions\u2019 committee members that there have been discussions about whether to strike out in different directions in the future,\u201d he began.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem is that South Africa<\/a> and New Zealand will remain premier touring destinations, so you are talking about a once-in-every-12-years tour. It might be that Australia has recovered its place at rugby union\u2019s top table by then \u2013 but what if things go backwards?<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of this is straightforward. Talk of taking on France is misguided. A format that contains only Six Nations players would imitate the world\u2019s oldest and premier rugby union tournament, which has been consistently popular and commercially successful.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe United States would be ideal if the Eagles could deliver long-hoped-for standards, but what if you commit to it and improvements do not come? There are many factors that work against the US vision, and I cannot see them being solved even in the medium term.<\/p>\n

\u201cTouring the Pacific Islands and Argentina would be good for the image of the game, but commercially challenging, and the Lions<\/a> are about making money in the professional era. One challenge is the R360 professional circus, which is said to be imminent.<\/p>\n

David Campese on what should \u2018really worry\u2019 Lions after win over \u2018weak\u2019 Wallabies and the changes he would make that requires Andy Farrell \u2018rethink\u2019<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhere do the Lions fit in a rugby world that might see all its top players playing against each other 16 times a year? What is the attraction of Lions players taking on opponents who might already be regular teammates or adversaries?\u201d<\/p>\n

Reflecting on the current Test series, which continues in Melbourne this Saturday before finishing in Sydney on August 2, Moore added: \u201cThe Wallabies will get better in the remaining two Tests but so should the Lions<\/a>. Their lineout set piece malfunctioned in a way that could have been telling in a tighter contest and their inaccuracy around try-scoring chances can be rectified.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of relative merits of what might come, the gap between the sides should not close if both sides improve as they ought to.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf all the statistics you can scrutinise from the first Test, the most telling is that the Lions made around twice as much ground after contact as the Aussies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis meant that breakdowns were constantly moving forward in the Lions\u2019 favour, with the Australian defence pressured continually.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf that equation cannot be neutralised, it is difficult to see how Australia are going to be able to play from an even field, and even if they do so, you have the fact the Lions\u2019 bench is going to be far more experienced and talented than anything the Aussies can summon.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE<\/strong>: British and Irish Lions player ratings: Owen Farrell the \u2018best\u2019 of an \u2018underwhelming\u2019 lot in hard-fought victory<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A British and Irish Lions great has named a surprise destination for a future trip amid calls for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":284760,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[186,37732,5313,225,90462,12,4151,79,16,15,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-284759","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-brian-moore","10":"tag-british-and-irish-lions","11":"tag-home-page","12":"tag-internationals","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-rugby","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114901647620896262","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=284759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284759\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}