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28th June 2021
03:08pm BST

Conor Murray was named Lions tour captain after Alun Wyn Jones' injury. (Credit: Sportsfile)[/caption]
"Going forward," said Goode, "Conor Murray is the new Lions captain.
"World-class player, in my opinion, brilliant box-kicker, a physical 9 and he has obviously shown in the last two Lions tours what a great player he is."
Goode admitted he did not have much knowledge of Murray as a captain and threw that to O'Brien, who played with him in green for eight years.
"It's a funny one," O'Bren commented, "because Conor wouldn't really see himself as a captain, but he would have been in all our leadership groups, over the years. "He has so much experience now. I do often forget that this is his third tour. He's one of the driving forces in the Irish team. He's definitely going to be a Test starter, if he stays fit." "I do think that was a factor [in Murray being named captain]," O'Brien added. "If Warren Gatland had just handed the captaincy over to Owen Farrell, there's no guarantee that he is going to start."Another Lions legend backing Murray to take to the task of leading the tourists in South Africa is a man he played understudy to during the victorious tour to Australia in 2013. Mike Phillips, who started all three Tests on the 2009 tour to South Africa, weighed in with the definitive take on the Limerick native's new calling: https://twitter.com/mikephillips009/status/1409163079523483649 Even Murray himself would not argue [too much] with that. WATCH THE BRITISH & IRISH HOUSE OF RUGBY:
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