Matt Williams: B&I Lions series a ‘raging success’ after ‘unmitigated disaster’ in South Africa

Outspoken pundit Matt Williams has hit out at the notion that the Test series between the Wallabies and British and Irish Lions was not a success.

The former Scotland head coach believes that it was a “raging success” and hailed the Wallabies for their remarkable improvement after an awful performance against Fiji prior to the series.

False narrative

Williams pointed to the number of tries and points scored on previous tours compared to 2025 to “expose many of the falsehoods being tossed about”.

“On the 2021 tour of South Africa, the tour games averaged a staggering 45 points and the horridly negative tactics of both teams meant that the Lions only managed to average 16 points in the Test matches,” he wrote in his Irish Times column.

“During the 2025 tour of Australia, the Lions averaged 39 points in the tour games. So on this tour the Lions scored fewer points against the Australian provincial teams than they did in their 2013 and 2021 tours and only two points more than in South Africa in 2009.

“Yet the false narrative from the loud and aggressive would have you believe that on this tour the Australians were so weak that the Lions’ scores have been overwhelming.”

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Williams states that because of the Wallabies’ unexpected success against the tourists, the “loud and aggressive” voices have now turned on their own and are “twisting the truth” by claiming that the Lions were below standard.

“The only grave error that the Lions organisation and their supporters made is that they forgot that the tour was as much for Australia as it was for the Lions,” he continued.

“The narrative that this tour was somehow not a raging success for both the Lions and Rugby Australia is deeply false.

“Consider that 453,167 people attended matches across this exceptional tour. A record for the Lions. The second Test at the MCG held the highest attendance ever for a Lions match. The Tests produced some brilliant rugby in a highly competitive series that generated bundles of cash for the four Lions nations and has bailed Australia out of a financial quagmire. One estimate of profit sits at AUS$51 million (€28.5 million).”

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Praise for B&I Lions

The 65-year-old says that Australia were inspired by the fear of being humiliated by the Lions and possessed the Wallabies to play like “none of us thought they could” and almost snatch the series.

Williams reserved praise for Andy Farrell and his charges too, who he believes re-established the Lions’ on-field standards, which were not evident when Warren Gatland led the tourists against the Springboks four years ago.

“After the unmitigated disaster that was the Lions in South Africa 2021, Andy Farrell and his team have re-established the on-field standards demanded by the great traditions of the Lions,” he wrote.

“The Lions played a high tempo, attractive and entertaining style of running rugby that Australians enjoyed and appreciated. For which the Lions deserve great credit and respect.

“If the Lions had continued with the negative and self-destructive tactics from 2021, the Australian public, who demand running rugby, would have walked away and the game in Oz may not have survived.”

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