Ireland great recalls TV ‘ticker tape’ gaffe that left him believing he hadn’t been selected for B&I Lions tour to New Zealand
Gordon D'Arcy on the attack with the 2005 British and Irish Lions
Retired Ireland midfielder Gordon D’Arcy has revealed a startling story about the 2005 British and Irish Lions tour to New Zealand, claiming that he spent squad selection day mistakenly believing he hadn’t been included by Clive Woodward.
The centre recalled sitting in a Dublin café with some Leinster teammates watching the television as the selection unfolded. However, with the TV volume turned down, the group were relying on an on-screen ticker tape to tell them who was in.
For whatever reason, Sky Sports omitted D’Arcy’s name from the list that they broadcast. It left him deflated and he quickly went back to his weights session with his turned phone off.
It was only that night, when his father tracked him down, that he learned there had been a ticker tape mistake and that he was named in Woodward’s squad.
D’Arcy revisited his 20-year-old horror story in his latest Irish Times column, describing the tension surrounding the announcement and the disappointment that he was erroneously made to feel following the on-screen selection error.
“I wasn’t in the mood for platitudes or commiserations…”
“In 2005, a group of us stood in the café at David Lloyd Riverview in Dublin, waiting nervously as Sky Sports announced that year’s squad live on TV,” he wrote, revisiting the day Woodward named the Lions squad that would go on to lose the Test series 0-3 to the All Blacks.
“Leinster had just moved into a new training facility behind the gym. It was modest by today’s standards at UCD, but compared to getting changed at the boot of your car or lifting weights in a shed, we felt like royalty.
“Brian O’Driscoll had already been confirmed as Lions captain. For the rest of us, there was a palpable tension.
“Your selection was now out of your hands. Performances during the Six Nations counted. Displays in the European Cup may have also made a difference, while reputations were known to weigh heavily.
2005 Lions boss Clive Woodward
“As Bill Beaumont read the names, the volume was turned down and we all scanned the ticker tape across the bottom of the screen.
“‘D’ came and went without my name. Still hopeful, I waited for ‘G’ – but nothing.
“Delighted for my teammates, quietly disappointed for myself, I returned to the weights session, finished the day and left my phone on silent. I wasn’t in the mood for platitudes or commiserations.
“Later that evening, my dad rang. It turned out there had been a mistake with the ticker tape. I was on the plane. An inauspicious start, but a start nonetheless.”
