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Tour Tales - Brian Moore & the 1993 Lions tour

B

Bullitt

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Brian Moore has some wonderful memories of the victorious Lions tour of Australia in 1989, but the former England hooker describes his visit to New Zealand with the 1993 Lions as a "gloomy experience".

The tour lacked team spirit, and "the iron will to succeed never existed in a large section of the party" Moore revealed in his autobiography. "It is so easy, when bad apples are in the barrel, you become enticed. You can get infected by the kind of atmosphere which prevailed on that tour and I'm not absolving myself.

"I was chosen on the bench for the Otago game and the day before the game three of us went for lunch. We were soon joined by three others. We ordered a conservative single bottle of wine between us, had one glass each and the bottle was empty. Three players left. The remaining three of us had another eight bottles between us, staggered back to the hotel as dark fell - then staggered straight into a teem meeting feeling completely out of it.

"I wasn't playing in the match and I didn’t get called up as a replacement during the game (which the Lions lost 37-24), but that is no excuse. I shouldn't have become involved.

"There were sporadic efforts during the tour to get the team off the beer. Geoff Cooke [tour manager] called a meeting with the senior players, saying he thought there was a problem, that the boys were drinking too much... but the message never got through. The midweek team all but disintegrated onto a giant ****-up!

"A Lions team needs complete concentration. In 1993, concentration wavered fatally.

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That's what we like to hear, proper tour stories involving alcohol. So who has tour tales to add??
 
Columbus Ohio, Ohio Rugby Classic, April 29, 30
Short Tale 1:
After a day that saw us win our opening 2 matches in pool play, one on a dramatic extra time penalty by our fly half, we decided to settle into our hotel and have a good amount of drinking, and smoking 'cigars'. So after a few ours im sitting in the hotel room with a few of the guys, a lock, a prop, and a flanker. So were all sittin around talking ****, and i decide ive had enough beer for the moment and i was going to run down to the grocery store with a few guys and get some food. So as i'm leaving the room and the door is shutting i hear the lock say to the prop "No, Don't Start Kissing Me!". And i just let the door shut and after that who knows what happend.

Short Tale 2:
The first night we arrive in Columbus it was around 9 PM, we had a few matches in the morning, but that still doesnt stop us from having a rip roaring time. So the prop, who i am good friends with, and a few of the other guys decide to oder a prostitute for our forewards coach. So we call up a 'Lady Friend' and give them the address of the hotel we were staying at. So some 20-25 odd minutes later guess who shows up, none other than the blonde and her body guard. Knowing his room number she knocks on his door and he opens it and immediately is suprised/ embarassed because of some onlookers, and shuts the door, and we're all laughin our asses in the hall way. Of course soon enough he tells her to add the props cell phone number to the Columbus Gay Hotline. And to this day he still gets calls on it from elgible "bachelors" in the Columbus area!

Short Tale 3:
On the final night before the last day of competition i decided to go back with my Fly Half to his brothers appartment with a few of the guys, a wing, a flanker, a center, a prop and me and the fly half. So we get there and cook a grand meal of chicken and pasta. Soon enough the prop, flanker, wing, and center all want to go to a party on the college campus, so me and the fly half throw all caution aside and decide to go. So we get there and its crazy for about 4 hours and at 2 am we decide we better go back and get some sleep. But on the way we find out we left our flanker at the party in the middle of a campus at 2 am. But we dont decide to go back and look and we just went back to the appartment and fall asleep. Then about 8 am when we wake up guess who we find on the porch? The flanker, somehow he found his way through downtown all the way to the appartment in the middle of the night.
 

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