AUCKLAND POSTCARD

IT’S goodbye to Auckland then, hello to a hectic four-match schedule over 11 days from Saturday onwards in four different cities. Travel broadens the mind and while you fear what the on-pitch schedule might do to these circusring under-performers, the frequently changing scenery in the next week and a half can only be therapeutic for the head. The City of Sails, home to the Lions for six of the first eight nights in New Zealand, won’t be missed. An urban sprawl with a population of 1.5 million, Auckland is completely out of kilter with the rest of the country, where three million people occupy a two-island land mass, roughly the equivalent size of Britain. Getting into other cities where rugby fever will be all-consuming will deliver a more authentic New Zealand experience for Warren Gatland’s tourists. Auckland doesn’t really care that much about rugby, an apathy in keeping with big city sports teams the world over who don’t win all that much. If you struggle there is no hiding, no sympathy as invariably it’s the place where the biggest media concentration. Look at the rough ride a poorly-supported Leinster used to get in Dublin until they made their European breakthrough. The Blues operate out of a transient set-up where they are currently based at a racing track. They don’t own their own facilities, don’t have a downtown presence. And there was little evidence of excitement that the Lions were on the prowl. You have to hope it will be different in a fortnight’s time when the Test series opener will be, by then, just days away at Eden Park. How rugby can generate a bolt of electricity was clear with the thrill on arrival in Christchurch, a real rugby city with a noescape rugby intensity. The tour will now start giddily shifting through the gears after the guts of a week being hidden away. It should be all the better for it.