Be 'prepared to win with skill but be ready to win by will' - Katie Taylor message helped Lions to second half comeback

Irish Examiner

5 hours ago

A video message from boxing hero Katie Taylor helped stir the British & Irish Lions into a comeback for the ages at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
For Jack Conan, like the Olympic gold medalist and professional world champion a native of Bray, Co. Wicklow, Taylor's address to the squad in the build-up to Saturday's second Test was remarkably prescient as the No.8 admitted the Lions were far from at their best as Australia fought for their lives to stay in the series following their first-Test defeat seven days earlier.
Conan and co. had to dig deep to fight back from 23-5 down after 30 minutes to snatch a 26-24 victory thanks to a last-minute try from Hugo Keenan.
It was the only time in the game that the Lions had been in front and Conan said: 'We were not at our best by any measure, but physically the lads dug in unbelievably well.
'We had a video from Katie Taylor earlier in the week and it was unbelievably poignant and powerful. It spoke about being prepared to win with skill, but be ready to win by will.
'I think that was something that summed up today massively because we were not at our best at all.
'Pretty disappointing how we played, but we played for 80 minutes. Barry (Keenan) getting over the line last minute was just unbelievable.
'I think the celebrations and the craic in the changing room, if we went out and we won by 20, it wouldn't be the same.
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'Everyone's just over the moon. To be part of a Lions winning series team is just incredibly special.
'I feel incredibly humbled and honoured to be part of it all.
'Not my best game, but a lot of us weren't at the races at all, but we stuck in there.
'You can't fault the effort. I thought the defensive sets we put in, just whacking people and just staying in there was unbelievable.
"Something that will go down in history, they weren't writing the history books about how shit we were, but they'll say that we won and that's all that matters.
'Just so special to be part of it."
Conan conceded that coming from Bray had made Taylor's pep talk even more special.
'Massively. Huge. Someone to come from the town I'm from, I'm incredibly proud of where I come from and I know Katie is as well.
'She's gone on to achieve incredible feats in the boxing world and to be such a superstar and be just incredibly humble and driven and knock it out of herself is something that we kind of leant on as well, because we knew that Australia are a hugely proud nation and they showed it today in spades.
'They were unbelievable, they really were, but we just stuck in it for 80 minutes and just incredibly proud of the effort from the lads.
'I know things didn't click and we weren't flowing properly, but we were getting off the line, trying to hit people, trying to make it count every chance we got.
'And I think we did that and that's why we got the result in the end.' The Leinster and Ireland back-rower said the impact of Taylor's message, arranged by her former mentor and current Ireland and Lions performance coach Gary Keegan, had reached beyond the Irish players in the Lions squad.
'Gary Keegan would have been very close with her and helped her through her amateur career into her professional career, he's the link there.
'Lads absolutely loved it because it meant a lot to me being from the same place and seeing her on the world stage, but I think everyone loved it, even the English and the Scottish boys and the Welsh boy, it resonated with everyone.
'It was unbelievably poignant, it was class. It really hit home for us, it was brilliant.'
Conan, who was playing his fifth consecutive Lions Test match having been ever-present during the 2021 series against South Africa, hailed the 2025 team's ability to stay calm and collected when the Wallabies had stormed into an 19-point lead and looked proved to level the series.
'It's an unbelievable privilege to be part of this group. No bad fellas, absolutely no bad fellas.
'Everyone is unbelievably sound, everyone wants the team to do well whether you're playing or you're not playing and it was a disjointed week with the Pacific Nations game on the Tuesday night and everything else so it was a bit tricky.
'We trained Monday, Tuesday but really lightly and then Thursday we were, if you ask the lads, we were pretty shocking when we trained on Thursday, we were all over the place, so maybe that fed into a bit of Saturday but it doesn't matter.'
Conan also had praise for match-winning hero Keegan, though he had every reason to grumble given the full-back opted to go it alone to score rather than take the safer option and pass out wide to his No.8.
"I was shouting for it, but Barry goes and scores a try so I've no complaints. If he bottled it there in that moment I would have killed him and kicked the arse off him afterwards, but that was great.
'Tense moments there at the end with the clean out but that's never a penalty, that's an unbelievable clear out from Jac (Morgan) and I think he had a savage impact, I think the whole bench was brilliant – Gengey, Faz, Cheese – James Ryan - was unbelievable when they came on, Ronan as well, absolutely smashing lads.
'I thought the impact off the bench was unbelievable, Blair as well making line breaks to everyone else which was huge, so we needed that lift from the bench because we were not great by our own admission."
As for Keenan, Conan added: "Delighted for him, because he had a bit of a rocky start to the campaign with the sickness that derailed him for a while and it's a testament to his professionalism and staying in it.
'I was delighted for him, now in saying that, I would have liked it more if he gave me the ball on the edge of and I scored the try. No, delighted for Barry, I probably would have dropped it."