Peter Jackson: Impossible to over-estimate what’s at stake on Saturday

ON THE STRETCH: Ireland's Tadhg Beirne with Scott Barrett of New Zealand in a line-out

Of all the Irishmen in all the world, only three know what it takes to win a Test series in New Zealand: a Dublin publican, a Belfast solicitor and a farmer’s boy from Antrim.

What Sean Lynch, Mike Gibson and Willie John McBride accomplished long ago ensures that they still stand apart in their twilight years as much as in days of yore. Come Saturday morning, the holy trinity of old Lions will be very happy to find themselves superseded at long last, not by three Irish players but 23.