Greatest British and Irish Lions XV: Number eight

James While

With the 2021 Lions tour to South Africa complete, Planet Rugby takes a stab at selecting the greatest British and Irish Lions XV of all time.

For the next 15 days, we will pick our favourite players from four nominations per position – if you don’t agree with us you can vote on social media for your dream team.

We have judged our criteria solely on contributions to the Lions in Test matches and there’s a few surprises in store.

With something like 120 years worth of players to choose from, it’s been a tough task but here we go with our number eight.

Nominees

Mervyn Davies (Wales)

Caps: 8
Tours: 2
Points: 0

As an ever-present Test player on two of the most successful tours in British & Irish Lions history, Davies proved himself as one of the greatest number eights ever to play the game.

The Welshman was at the heart of the most celebrated era in the British and Irish game, donning the famous red jersey for the 1971 tour to New Zealand and the 1974 tour to South Africa and whilst the phrase legend is perhaps overused in this day and age, to describe International Hall of Fame inductee Davies as anything less would be doing him a great disservice.

The former Swansea and London Welsh number eight made the starting XV for all four Tests against the All Blacks in 1971, before achieving the same feat in South Africa three years later.

Both tours resulted in series victories for the Lions, with Davies playing a starring role from the back of the scrum as he revealed himself as the outstanding number eight of his, and arguably any, generation.

Nicknamed ‘Merv the Swerve’, Davies was a superb all-round athlete who was equally comfortable in attack or defence. A hard-runner and an aggressive tackler, Davies had the handling capabilities to link forward and back play and keep the Lions on the front foot against formidable opposition.

A previous world record holder for the most number of international caps as a number eight, Davies played 38 times for Wales, without missing a match. His achievement was even more remarkable given the fact that he went from the third XV at London Welsh to his country’s starting side in just four months.

By 1974 the understanding he had developed with Gareth Edwards created an unbreakable axis within the ‘middle five’ that did much to destroy the Springboks’ belief in their own invincibility. Davies pulled the strings alongside Roger Uttley and Fergus Slattery as he again featured in all four of the Tests, helping the tourists secure a famous 3-0 series victory.

However, he was to be denied that honour as his career came to an unfortunate end in 1976 when he suffered a brain haemorrhage playing for Swansea in the Welsh Cup semi-final.

In a total of 46 international appearances for Wales and the Lions, Davies remarkably only ended up on the losing side nine times and he will forever be remembered as a legend of the game.

Greatest Lions moment: His abilities at the back of the lineout prompted the legendary Sir Colin Meads to claim that Davies was “the one player who probably had the biggest impact on that 1971 Lions Test series”.

Dean Richards (England)

Caps: 6
Tours: 2
Points: 0

Combining his rugby with his career as a Hinckey policeman, often heading straight from shifts to link up with the team and then back to work again, even during his international playing days, Richards was a league title winner with Leicester in 1988 as the previous generation’s Cup Kings handed over to a new guard and then again as captain in 1995.

Richards earned 48 caps for England, which was a world record for a number eight at the time – his trademark was the bear-hug tackle in which he could turn an opponent thus presenting the ball to his pack. Having played for England Schools and the U23s, he made his full England debut against Ireland, scoring two tries in a revitalised pack. Playing once against Scotland in the 1987 Five Nations tournament, he was selected to play in the first Rugby World Cup Down Under. He played in four games but this was ultimately a disappointing tournament for the team, which was beaten in a dour quarter-final against the old enemy Wales. Now a regular in the team, his powerful drives and the ability to be in the right place at the right time earned him a formidable reputation on the international scene.

It was on the Lions tour of Australia in 1989 that he fully demonstrated his skills. Having lost the first Test in a lacklustre performance, the tourists had to bounce back in the Ballymore Test. In a game that was later to be called, ‘The Battle of Ballymore’, Richards was at the heart of the victory. One of three policemen in the pack, he was part of a world-class back-row, including Mike Teague and skipper Finlay Calder. Taking the Wallabies on up front in a very physical confrontation, the pack provided the platform for the Lions’ backs to win the game and the series. Disappointment would follow on his return with a shoulder injury keeping him out of the 1990 season but Richards returned in both Lions and England colours and was a pivotal player on the Lions tour to New Zealand in 1993.

Greatest Lions moment: After the Battle of Ballymore in 1989, when interviewed after the game, Richards suggested to the media he had played in tougher club games much to the mirth of his fellow Lions.

Alun Pask (Wales)

Caps: 8
Tours: 2
Points: 0

Given how exceptionally gifted a player Pask was, there was a curious sense of unfulfillment about his rugby career. He was one of the great forwards of the 1960s and, briefly, a distinguished captain of Wales but was contentiously denied the ultimate honour of leading the British Isles.

If ever there were a rugby player ahead of his time it was Pask, who gave expression to a sense of athleticism and ball-handling skill quite out of keeping with the norm during his own era, though these days rather commonplace. There was no finer sight in the game than Pask, 6ft 3in and 15st, in full cry with the ball clutched in one hand in a manner which came to be associated with the Fijians. Indeed his capacity as an attacking forward sometimes gave rise to doubts about his willingness to perform the more prosaic defensive duties, though there were a number of notable international occasions when he gave the lie to this misconception.

He was a Lion in South Africa in 1962, playing in the first three Tests but missing the fourth because of a cracked rib and earned a worthy reputation as a cerebral type of player reliant more on pace coupled with tactical and positional sense than on brute force, rapier as opposed to bludgeon.

Pask was the clear favourite to captain the Lions in Australia and New Zealand at the end of that season but his prospects instantly evaporated when Wales lost narrowly in Ireland and the home win over France that followed made no difference.

Pask made the tour, but only as a humble lieutenant. At the time Wales had notoriously never had a Lions captain and he was widely presumed in the Principality to have been the victim of a hidden selection agenda. Indeed the choice of Mike Campbell-Lamerton of Scotland in preference to Pask was shown to be misconceived when Campbell-Lamerton could not hold his Test place, though for the games against New Zealand in Wellington and Auckland it was another Welshman, David Watkins, rather than Pask who was given the captaincy.

Greatest Lions moment: Pask’s running performances on the hard grounds of Australia were pivotal and none more so as he starred in the victory in Sydney in 1966.

Jim Telfer (Scotland)

Caps: 8
Tours: 2 (plus one as coach)
Points: 0

The son of a Borders shepherd, Telfer is a legend of Scottish rugby on two fronts.

As a belligerent back-row, his courage, work-rate and rucking skills made him an automatic choice for Scotland from his 1964 debut onwards.

In only his second Test, he earned the Scots a 0-0 draw against New Zealand by diving on a loose ball near his own line and hanging on for grim death while the All Blacks tried to shoe him to oblivion. Two months later, on his first start at number eight, he scored a try to help beat England and spark the first pitch invasion seen at Murrayfield.

Telfer trained five times a week in order to gain an edge – a commitment that was unheard of in the 1960 and he became a disciple of the ferocious rucking game employed by New Zealand sides of that era, something he took into his own coaching philosophy in later years.

He played eight Lions Tests across the 1966 and 1968 tours, and Colin Meads, with whom he was to cross swords on many an occasion, believes Telfer should have captained the first of those tours to his country. “He should have been an All Black forward,” he says.

A chemistry teacher by profession, Telfer began coaching in earnest in 1974 and so embarked on a golden second career. Highlights include coaching Scotland to a first Grand Slam for 59 years in 1984; whipping the Lions pack into shape in 1997 in an infamous session of 60 scrums in half an hour; and securing Melrose’s first Scottish Division One title – a success that brought him as much pleasure as any.

Nicknamed ‘Creamy’ after a Grand National horse of the 1940s that he admired, Telfer coached with the same hard-nosed, no-nonsense attitude that he showed as a player. He remains the only Scottish international to have played against the big three southern hemisphere giants and not lost – an epitaph he will probably take to his grave.

Greatest Lions moment: Whilst this is about playing for the Lions, where Telfer is concerned there can only be one – the Everest speech as coach in 1997: ‘This is your f***ing Everest, boys,’ said Telfer.’ Very few ever get a chance in rugby terms to get to the top of Everest. You have the chance today.” Just simply wow.

Our pick

Whilst we have four wonderful players who could all grace our greatest Lions number eight shirt with ease, Mervyn Davies’ reputation and record speaks for itself and he completes our team.

by James While