George Gregan: For teams to move from good to great you have to be ruthless – that’s next step for this Wallabies side

In 2001, Australia were hammered by the British and Irish Lions in a stunning first Test at the Gabba in Brisbane. In 1997, the Wallabies shipped 61 points against South Africa at Loftus Versfeld in the Tri-Nations.

After the former, the hosts turned things around to win Tests one and two and complete their only multi-Test series victory over the Lions in history. In the latter, virtually the same Australia squad clinched the 1999 Rugby World Cup just two years later.

A central performer in all those games and during that era was former Australia scrum-half and captain George Gregan, a 139-Test cap veteran.

Though small in stature, Gregan was and still is a figure who exudes leadership. He’s seen countless highs and lows in Australian rugby, and met with Sky Sports at his Sydney hotel this week to discuss the current side and the fine line between turning a corner and remaining stuck in a rut.

“The funny thing is when our side made that step from being not so good to good, we went from good to great by winning a lot of Test matches by small margins. We also put teams away when we needed to.

“Part of the DNA within that team – we didn’t intentionally go down to the last play of the game – was we were very comfortable in tight games going to the end. We almost became calmer in that situation.

“That was the strength of that group of players. There was no magic sauce to it, it always comes through hard work and then there’s a lot of trust and belief.

“Even though you don’t want to be in that spot, when that moment came it was: ‘Okay, we’ve been here before, let’s do it again.’

“Ultimately it’s something you can dial back into. It’s a little well of positive experience and execution.

“It sounds simple, but that’s what you need to do. At the weekend, the current Wallabies side gave themselves an opportunity to win that game and put the Lions away. That’s the first step. Now they need to be good enough to win it.”

‘You have to take the referee out of things – no use focusing on one call’

Breaking into the international scene in 1994, Canberra-native Gregan tasted Bledisloe Cup successes in 1994, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2002, Tri-Nations titles in 2000 and 2001, and a World Cup triumph in 1999. Heady days for rugby union in Australia indeed.

He also led Australia to a second World Cup final in 2003 on home soil as captain, defeating the All Blacks in a semi-final en route on the day Gregan infamously reminded the pre-tournament favourites the length of a World Cup cycle (“four more years boys”).

The Wallabies then ran into Jonny Wilkinson and Martin Johnson’s marvellous England side, who dramatically became champions via the right boot of the former at the end of extra time.

Inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 2009, the World Rugby Hall of Fame in 2013 and a recipient of the Order of Australia in 2004, Gregan’s is a life and career in sport to match among the best.

Unlike much of the coverage in his homeland this week which has sought to focus on the perceived injustice of Jac Morgan’s clear-out at the final ruck before Hugo Keenan’s last-minute winning try, Gregan steadfastly refuses to countenance the losing of the Test being narrowed to one call.

It’s an attitude which, again, perhaps gives an insight into the inner workings of a champion in his sport.

“I’m not a fan of talking about the referee’s decision in the last play. If you talk about that – and Joe Schmidt and that Wallaby team will be gutted that on another occasion maybe there is a different decision – you can make a decision around the ruck every ruck, to be fair.

“The Wallabies had a chance to win that game before that last one. They were leading the game for 79 minutes, so they did everything but win it.

“You kind of had a sense it was going to come down to the last play of the game. The way the Lions rallied from being down 23-5 with back-to-back scores before half-time, that was the chance when the Wallabies needed to score again and say: ‘We’ll see you next week.’

“Then I think the Lions would have been gone, but quality teams, you give them a chance, they’ll score.

“The Lions had a chance to nick the series there and then, and that’s what happened.

“Yes, it would have been nice to have a decider, but it was a much-improved performance and a positive step forward. Obviously there’s heartache in not being able to level the series but that’s sport.

“You have to be ruthless when you get in front. Don’t give them a chance to come back. Though it’s easy to say sat here in a nice hotel when you’re not playing against guys who are competitive and wanting to chase their own bit of history as well.”

‘Team’s that constantly speak about team spirit don’t have it’ | ‘AFL, NRL, cricket love in Australia has always been there’

The ebb and flow of momentum in sport is an impossible phenomenon to explain.

Often sides that are behind at half-time are far the happier. In some matches a four-point deficit in the second half can feel insurmountable, while in others three score leads can be wiped out and the result tenuous until the end.

For Gregan, all a side can do is remain consistent in terms of their week-to-week preparations.

“There’s lots of data now but there’s so much intangible. I love it when people talk about team spirit. Teams that talk about spirit a lot, they don’t have it.

“When you have it, you don’t talk about it. It’s like: ‘We’ve got a good culture.’ We didn’t talk about culture. Culture might be going to Ireland and having a Guinness.

“That’s the piece. You work hard for each other and that comes from being in good teams.

“Is there a measurement on that? I don’t know. There’s things you do that just become habits. Becoming honest with each other, setting a standard. It becomes pretty consistent.

“It sounds quite boring, but that stuff matters. It becomes the norm. If you start seeing positive results off each other, you continue doing it.

“The evolution of that team was from being very consistent in how we approached and reviewed every game. You live with the result, you learn from it.

“Sometimes we reviewed harder when we won. You need to, otherwise you can get a rude shot like pitching up to the Gabba and getting smoked in the first Test…”

Being in Australia, the sense they are a sport-mad country is palpable. But it’s also one of the narratives publicised in recent years in conjunction with the struggles of its national rugby union side.

Rugby league and Aussie rules football are both tremendously popular, as is cricket. Union has to fight for its place in terms of coverage and interest, but Gregan claims such a scenario has always been thus, and failed to halt success before.

“Rugby union is always going to have a presence here. We’re always going to have special athletes who play for the Wallabies. It’s no different with this squad.

“I’ve heard lots of commentary on rugby league and AFL, but they’ve always been there and always will be. There’s never been a time when they weren’t.

“We were in Melbourne last week at Hotel Collingwood and they only had AFL’s Super Saturday on. I said: ‘You’ve got to have some rugby on, it’s the Lions,’ and they put it on one of the TVs. That’s never going to change.

“It’s always been the way and it’s just amusing, but when a big international event comes to Melbourne, you get huge support. You fill that out. The MCG is a real cauldron for sport.

“The cricketers are number one, it’s always been that way, but when the Wallabies play internationally, the country gets behind it. When they start turning that corner and they’re successful, everyone starts talking about rugby.

“When Australia beat England at Twickenham last year with Max Jorgensen’s last minute try it was the first news article on sport and found the back pages. Saturday’s Lions game was the same. It means a lot to this country, the national team. You want them to do well.

“They’ll turn the corner, but you always want them to turn a bit quicker. Last week at the MCG was an occasion, 90,000-plus, and when you’re sitting in and part of it, you feel very privileged, actually. It was amazing.”

Lions in 2001: ‘I still remember the sheer speed of those Tests, 24 years on’

It’s almost hard to believe the Lions series in Australia Gregan was front and centre of is virtually a quarter of a century ago now.

Asked for his recollections of a memorable first Test for the tourists against the then world champions, Gregan marks it as a day he’s never forgotten.

“They just ambushed us in that first one. The game has changed but it sort of remains the same. The skill, speed, intensity, urgency, how they started. It was relentless.

“They were just on the front foot and Jason Robinson’s scored within the first three minutes, Brian O’Driscoll does what he does. Our national anthem gets changed to Waltzing O’Driscoll by the end of the game. There was just red everywhere.

“I remember we all came off and it was like: ‘What’s just happened? We’re playing at home?’ There’s never a bad Lions team but that was an amazing group.

“All those English boys went on two years later to win the World Cup. You add O’Driscoll and Scott Quinnell, they just smashed us in all departments. We scored a couple of tries in the end, but we were never really in that Test.”

As in 2025, onto Melbourne the 2001 series went for the second Test, and with the Lions dominant in the first half an 11-6 lead was all they had to show.

For many, the entire series swung on a serious injury suffered by Lions flanker Richard Hill near the end of the first half: the back-row knocked out following a savage elbow to the head by Wallabies centre Nathan Grey.

The Lions cried thuggery, but no action was taken. Gregan admits it was a pivotal moment.

“The Lions won the first three halves of that series. We were just hanging on in Melbourne by a thread. Honestly, Richard Hill got knocked out and that was big because Hilly was an assassin for George Smith. He was a very good, underrated player. And we won that second half.

“Suddenly we started going forward, getting our rhythm, our carrying, and we were on top.

“Then it was an epic game in Sydney which goes down to the wire. It comes down to moments. It was an amazing series.

“It was just fast, incredibly fast. I remember it just never stopped. Both teams were positive, that ball was in play a lot. It’s interesting, it’s 24 years ago but I remember that.

“There was a lot of contestable kicking because both teams were good off lineouts in terms of dangerous set-plays, so no one wanted to kick it out.

“It was mad, just another level. One of those days where you’re blowing after 40 minutes and thinking: ‘Have I got another 40 of this?’ And you do, it’s funny, you find another place. You can’t drop off because they’re not going to drop off, that was the nature of that series.