{"id":314388,"date":"2025-08-03T11:29:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-03T11:29:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/314388\/"},"modified":"2025-08-03T11:29:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-03T11:29:14","slug":"british-and-irish-lions-australia-have-won-a-lot-of-fans-back-former-wallabies-captain-stephen-moore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/314388\/","title":{"rendered":"British and Irish Lions: ‘Australia have won a lot of fans back’ – former Wallabies captain Stephen Moore"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australia have won back a lot of fans during the British and Irish Lions Test series, says former Wallabies captain Stephen Moore.<\/b><\/p>\n

Australia were well beaten in the first Test, but then came within one last-gasp Lions try of winning the second before taking the final Test 22-12 in Sydney<\/a> to prevent the tourists securing a 3-0 series whitewash.<\/p>\n

Ranked sixth in the world, two-time World Cup-winners Australia have been rebuilding after failing to qualify for the knockout stages of a Rugby World Cup for the first time in their history in 2023.<\/p>\n

A poor national team and the continued rise of rugby league and Australian rules football have been factors in a decline in interest in rugby union in the country.<\/a><\/p>\n

But the Lions, who the hosts have not beaten in a series since 2001, proved popular, with the second Test at Melbourne Cricket Crowd played in front of 90,307, while more than 80,000 watched the match in Sydney.<\/p>\n

“I know it sounds weird because we’ve lost the series, but I think the team will come out of this series in better shape than when they came into it,” Moore told BBC’s Rugby Union Weekly podcast.<\/a><\/p>\n

“Enhanced reputations individually, and collectively as a team. The people watching those games at the ground and on the TV will be proud of the way the Wallabies played for a lot of the series.<\/p>\n

“Even though the Lions won – they deserved to win – we’ve won a lot of fans back in the last three weeks.<\/p>\n

“The Test matches and particularly a Lions tour, that’s our shop window. That’s our chance to fill stadiums and get people talking about rugby [union].<\/p>\n

“Outside the noise around rugby league, and AFL is massive, that’s the biggest thing in town.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia have won back a lot of fans during the British and Irish Lions Test series, says former…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":314389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[4151,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-314388","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114964605479079613","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314388","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=314388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/314389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}