Andy Farrell left with tough Ireland decisions to make after mixed Lions Tour

What a difference a defeat makes. Andy Farrell was so very close to pulling off a perfect Lions tour. On Wednesday of last week, before Farrell named his final match-day squad of the 2025 tour, the picture was rosy. One more victory for a rare clean-sweep. The Lions – Jack Conan and Maro Itoje had vowed – were desperate for a performance where everything clicked and the tourists finished with the resounding win they felt destined for.

From an Irish perspective, this tour was buoying their sense of pride. Dan Sheehan marvelled in Melbourne about being part of a team – with so many of his friends – that had finally got over the line in a nerve-shredding classic. Eleven Ireland players had featured in each of the first two tests, while Joe McCarthy and Mack Hansen were said to be back in contention. Josh van der Flier surely had to be in the mix for a match-day role in Sydney. Surely?

The team was named and that Ireland trio all missed out. Hansen and McCarthy were, specifically, 85% ready to play, if needed. Sione Tuipulotu was also at 85%. None were needed. In the end, we had Owen Farrell at inside centre, Bundee Aki one slot over and Huw Jones playing on the right wing. That was only scratching the surface. The game-plan undoubtedly got smudged and blurry in the Sydney downpour.

Farrell is a tough man to face down. He has his way of doing things. Runs certain decisions by those closest to him, and sets his course unflinchingly. He can be terse and stubborn if some of his calls are questioned, or if results go against him but Farrell, generally, has a convivial relationship with the Irish press pack, yet there have been moments when he has bitten back. He was criticised, early in his reign as Ireland head coach, for coming off as too positive when France streamrolled through his side. He rode out pervading negativity when bringing his side to New Zealand, in 2022, for a five-match tour, at the end of a gruelling season.

Andy Farrell holds court in a tightly controlled media operation with the Lions (Photo Brendan Moran/Getty Images)

Before he departed on his Lions sabbatical, Farrell dug in over the Sam Prendergast and Jack Crowley debate and insisted no one is dropped in his team. We saw that again, on this Lions tour, when Owen Farrell and a handful of Scots were parachuted in. Last Thursday, he stared down the media and proclaimed every single player had fully bought into the team-first concept. If that is true, Farrell has pulled off two rare feats with two different sides.

Farrell is irrefutably an extremely good coach, and a proven leader of men. He is imperfect. Like all of us. He is human and in the good times, that can be glossed over.

In Irish rugby circles, during the Joe Schmidt era, the motto was ‘In Joe we trust’. That transferred to Farrell when he took over from his old boss. After the 2019 World Cup, the first year had some shaky moments but Farrell started to put his stamp on Ireland in 2021. We then had the winning tour to New Zealand, and a Six Nations Grand Slam in 2023. Those feats were part of a 17-match winning run. ‘In Andy we trust’ was the line you would hear, back in Ireland and over in France, during the 2023 World Cup. An over-reliance on Johnny Sexton? Andrew Porter’s scrummaging issues? Sixteen of the squad aged 30 or over? In Andy they trusted.

At that World Cup, it was all going swimmingly until it wasn’t. New Zealand – with Joe Schmidt having a big say on their tactics and launch-plays – had Ireland’s number. Porter was pinged repeatedly by Wayne Barnes. Sexton played the full 80 while Crowley kept his bib on. The ageing Irish manfully went phase after phase after phase, going nowhere fast, until time elapsed and they conceded a penalty.

The manner of defeat, and the players injured during it, will rankle for the Lions but we will only have a proper sense of appreciation for their Series win, though, when The Rugby Championship concludes.

Twenty-one months later, fans of England, Wales and Scotland were building up that trust in Farrell. So were the players. The travelling press pack may have questioned some call-ups, team selections or tactics, but the wins kept coming. Farrell almost pulled it off. Winning the Test Series 3-0 would have made him immortal.

He had bested Schmidt, the old master, but there was a sting in the tail. His Wallabies had come agonisingly close to levelling the series at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The Aussies warmed to the notion that this Lions team could be got at. Had Will Skelton, Rob Valentini and Noah Lolesio been fully fit and available for the entire series, how different the outcome might have been. In Sydney, with pride on the line, Australia played the wretched conditions better, went direct and had success.

The manner of defeat, and the players injured during it, will rankle for the Lions but we will only have a proper sense of appreciation for their Series win, though, when The Rugby Championship concludes.

Andrew Porter endured a tricky final Test at scrum-time (Photo Brendan Moran/Getty Images)

So, how is Ireland looking after this Lions tour? For the most part, peachy. Leaving a shadow coaching squad behind for the Georgia and Portugal games, Farrell brought along three Ireland coaches. Analyst Vinny Hammond, a host of support and backroom staff from the IRFU or who served with him before. All will come back from Australia richer for the experience. Farrell is contracted with the union until after the 2027 World Cup. The Lions definitely want him for the top job again, so would the IRFU be happy with a similar sabbatical arrangement? It may all rest on how Ireland fare in that World Cup, but in Simon Easterby and Paul O’Connell, the IRFU now have two coaches with head coaching experience.

Ireland players that emerge from this tour with huge credit include Dan Sheehan, Tadhg Furlong, Tadhg Beirne, Joe McCarthy, James Ryan, Jack Conan, Jamison Gibson-Park and Hugo Keenan. Furlong was already a Lions legend – adding another compelling chapter – while Sheehan, Beirne and Keenan join him at that status. Garry Ringrose may well have featured throughout the Test Series had it not been for his concussion issues. Hansen was unlucky with his foot injury. Jamie Osborne and Thomas Clarkson will look to kick on, over the coming years, and make the 2029 Lions tour to New Zealand.

Van der Flier was the cruellest cut of this Lions tour. He may have told Farrell that the past two months in Australia were the time of his life, but missing the big bash will crush him. Ireland’s best openside needs to return with an edge in the November Tests to prove to his coach that he can dominate at the next World Cup.

Aki commands huge levels of respect from his teammates and is a guy his teammates line up to follow, yet this was the tour when he started to look fallible.

The areas for concern, as highlighted by the Test Series, are on the left wing and in midfield. James Lowe has played through the pain for much of his career. Rugby players are never 100% but Lowe is at his best if he can hover around the 90% mark. He was strangely muted on this tour, aside for a couple of highlight reel moments. When he is at his best, it is inconceivable that Farrell would not start a Test without Lowe. The Leinster winger is 33 now and will be 35 by the time the World Cup rolls around. Farrell needs to look at other options there, and soon.

The same can be said for Ireland’s bank of centres – Ringrose (30), Aki (35), Robbie Henshaw (32) and Stuart McCloskey (33). Aki commands huge levels of respect from his teammates and is a guy his teammates line up to follow. This was the tour when he started to look fallible. All the chopping and changing to the centre partnerships was not ideal, but Aki was far from his best. He was successfully targeted by the Wallabies for some of their most devastating bursts, in the second Test. His third Test performance was littered with errors.

At 35, Bundee Aki finally saw his age catching up with him in the third Test and Farrell may have to reconfigure an ageing midfield (Photo Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images)

Aki would have been best suited in the No.23 jersey, as he wore in the first Test. A wrecking ball option, off the bench, for 25 or 30 minutes. He did it well in Brisbane, and was close to Man of the Match after his 28-minute cameo against Wales, earlier this year. Farrell bringing Owen Farrell to Australia, then into his Test squad, nixed the option of Aki the finisher.

Andy Farrell is fiercely loyal to those that deliver for him – hence the heavy Irish contingent Down Under. That loyalty may be sorely tested when it comes to Lowe, Aki and even Tadhg Furlong, as planning begins in earnest for the next World Cup.

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