Finn Russell is determined to cap a memorable time Down Under by driving The British & Irish Lions to a famous 3-0 series win over Australia.
Russell and his team-mates have already wrapped up a series win in the Qatar Airways British & Irish Lions Men's Tour to Australia 2025 heading into the third and final Test in Sydney, after Hugo Keenan’s late try sealed a dramatic 29-26 win in Melbourne.
An historic 3-0 clean sweep is now within touching distance and Russell is keen to soak up every last moment of the Tour while ensuring the focus remains on securing another victory over the Wallabies.
"Everyone here has been gunning for this for their whole career," he said. "To get to the Lions is one thing and then to get a series win is another.
“This is my third Tour and I'd not won one, so it's so special to get this, bringing four nations together to be a family for five, six weeks.
"But it's not job done yet. We need to go and try and finish it off next week. Even though we've got the series, we need to go and finish on a high.
"You've got to appreciate every part of it. You can't look back and think, ‘Had I not been injured in South Africa, had I been called out before in New Zealand’, you can't look like that. You've got to look at the positives.
"It's always a privilege getting called into the Lions, whether that's later on in the Tour or being there from the start.
"Everyone wants to play in that game [the third Test]. If we can make it a 3-0 series, that's amazing. Everyone's going to be gunning for that."
A series victory with the Lions caps a remarkable year for Russell, who has produced some of the best rugby of his career in the blues of Bath and Scotland and the red of the Lions.
The fly-half secured a treble with Bath, winning the English Premiership, the Premiership Rugby Cup and the European Challenge Cup as one of the oldest and most historic clubs finally returned to the top of English rugby.
Russell’s playmaking was central to those efforts, and his form has translated onto the ultimate stage with the Lions, for whom he has continued to pull the strings.
"This year's been very special. We've won a couple of titles with Bath - and I've not won much in my career,” he added.
“It's hard to appreciate it just now, because you're still in the moment, you're still half an hour or an hour after the game, so you're still riding on that wave.
"But when I get down time, and if I get any time away from the kids, I can reflect and it'll make even more special.”
Russell is rarely short of confidence, but even must have had at least some doubt that the Lions would be forced into a decider in Sydney when 23-5 down at the MCG on Saturday.
The Lions launched a storming comeback, with Keenan finishing off the job at the death – with Russell never worried that they would achieve the outcome they wanted.
"We had a lot of momentum, we were on top of them at the end of it,” he said. “We had them on the ropes when Blair [Kinghorn] broke through.
"There was no stress. The whole team was amazing. Jac Morgan's cleanout that obviously created the try, it was just sticking to what we were doing, just playing rugby."
