Battling the Lions: Try to forget, Gavin

If you are in any doubt about how seriously the Lions are taking their tour of New Zealand, you just have to talk with the captain of their 1993 side, Gavin Hastings.

Gavin told me that just the other day he had spent the morning watching the video of the first test on that tour - and he still did not know what the penalty was for.

The penalty, of course, was the Grant Fox kick that snatched a 20-18 All Blacks victory.

The Lions players, coaches and management were highly upset about that penalty at the time.

And here we are, 12 years later, and Gavin is still searching for answers. He also told me, with conviction unaltered by time, that the only try of the match - to Frank Bunce in the first minute after a Fox up-and-under - wasn't a try at all.

Bunce and Welsh winger Ieuan Evans went over the line with both sets of arms wrapped around the ball. Bunce was given the decision.

The theory was that he didn't get the ball down and that, had there been a video ref, the try would not have been given.

I don't know about that. I wasn't anywhere near the ball at the time and, to be honest, I barely remember the try being scored.

But I do know that those moments caused great anguish for the Lions. I wanted to tell Gavin - who became a good friend when he stayed and played in Auckland after the 1987 World Cup - to get over it, but then I thought that I've really only just got over the 1995 World Cup final.

What I do remember is that final penalty. Dean Richards tackled Bunce and tried to turn him and the referee, Australian Brian Kinsey, whistled for a penalty. Was it a justifiable penalty? Again, I don't know.

If you get a penalty in those circumstances, you don't waste any time thinking about whether it was justified. All I know is that, in the heat of those kind of battles, you must take your chances. I remember heading for the ref to ask for a kick at goal when I realised there was no need.

Foxy had the ball teed up and was looking impatiently at me. The decision had been taken. Never mind that I was the captain. Foxy just grabbed the ball, set it up and waited. And, of course, as he did so often in his All Black career, he kicked the goal and won the match.

For the All Blacks, this was definitely a test match that we got out of by the skin of our teeth. I was very lucky to have Foxy there.

He totally dominated teams and he was a tremendous help to me as captain, in all manner of ways - not just goal kicking.

He and John Kirwan had played against the 1983 Lions for Auckland and knew something about them but the rest of the side were younger and didn't really have as much of a sense of what the Lions were about.

Foxy and I were just in our 30s - he retired at the end of 1993 although I reckon he still had a few more years in him - but a lot of the other guys in that All Black team had nothing like as much of an exposure to the Lions.

That's another thing Gavin said to me - that players in Britain got to play for the Lions only every four years. I said straight away that All Blacks now get to play against them only once every 10-12 years.

When I was a kid, the 1971 Lions were our heroes.

For the first time, the kids of the entire nation stopped kicking broken-toe style like Don Clarke and started kicking round-the-corner like Barry John. We grew up with that kind of knowledge and heritage from the Lions in 1971 and 1977.

But the younger guys in the All Blacks for the first test in 1993 did not have that kind of background.

We were still getting over the World Cup of 1991 and I think it was fair to say that we hadn't really gelled as a team.

Also, the newer All Blacks didn't know the Lions as well. They had only experienced the 1983 tour and, with all due respect, that wasn't the same as the 1971, 1977 or 1993 tours. But they found out what the Lions were about in that first test.

I think the first test of any series heightens the nervousness and the pressure we put on ourselves. The All Blacks of 2005 won't have had much exposure to previous Lions tours either. They will have soaked up some of the hype and won't be in any doubt about what is in front of them for the first test.

Especially when the first whistle blows.

* Sean Fitzpatrick is a former All Black and a Herald on Sunday columnist