‘Australia are sh*te’ – Ex-internationals ‘campaign’ for British and Irish Lions to tour South Africa instead
Andy Goode has followed Ben Youngs in suggesting that the British and Irish Lions head to South Africa instead of Australia.
Former England fly-half Andy Goode has followed Ben Youngs in suggesting that the British and Irish Lions head to South Africa instead of Australia next year.
This comes in the wake of Australia’s 67-27 defeat to Argentina in round four of the Rugby Championship with ex-Scotland lock Jim Hamilton not mincing his words about the Wallabies.
Joe Schmidt’s side went out to a 20-3 lead after 30 minutes of the clash in Sante Fe before an epic collapse saw them suffer a record defeat at the hands of the South Americans.
Woeful Wallabies
Australia’s struggles in the Rugby Championship have raised concerns over how competitive they will be against Andy Farrell’s British and Irish Lions next year.
Ex-England scrum-half Youngs, who toured with the Lions last time in Australia in 2013, said that the Wallabies are in a ‘proper dark’ place on his podcast For the Love of Rugby and stated that the ‘Lions are better off going to South Africa‘.
His views have been echoed on The Rugby Pod where ex-Wales fly-half Dan Biggar, former England pivot Goode and ex-Scotland lock Hamilton all laid into the Wallabies.
Biggar believes that the performances in the Rugby Championship has taken the glimmering off of Wales’ performances in Australia in July.
“Australia getting 67 points chucked on them which clearly doesn’t help Wales’ perspective looking at that after losing the series,” he said.
“Everyone was quite positive about Wales, everyone was quite positive about New Zealand – I think England is slightly different – but the All Blacks were really poor against Argentina in that first Test.
“So you think a bit of the positivity has been taken off of that, Wales probably doesn’t look as good with the Wallabies getting absolutely humped on Saturday night.
“Ireland have probably come out of this with even more credit by just losing the first Test to the Springboks and just winning the second Test against a team that we have just waxed lyrical about for 15 minutes.”
Ex-Wallabies call on Joe Schmidt to end ‘massive argument’ and follow Springboks and Argentina
Take the tour back to South Africa
In response to Biggar’s summation of the July Tests and the first four rounds of the Rugby Championship, Hamilton added: “Ireland are class, England are better than we think still, Scotland is phenomenal at the minute, Wales average and Australia are sh*te.”
“I know there are loads going on but all I’m saying is it’s a Lions year next year, how are Australia even doing anything against the Lions, I don’t know. Maybe they will use this line and me calling them out but there ain’t a chance.”
This led Goode to say that a campaign should be started to take the tour back to South Africa having hosted the Lions in 2021 behind closed doors.
“Australia were 20 points to three up at the weekend and then got hosed 67-27,” he said.
“Can we campaign for the Lions to flip the tour and go to South Africa, please? It can’t happen but if you’re the Lions now at the end of the season and you’re picking anyone to play it’s South Africa.”
READ MORE: Timeline: How the wheels disastrously came off for Wallabies in their record defeat to Argentina
