When will Lions learn?

The saying goes: The more things change, the more they stay the same. But for the Lions they only seem interested in the second part, as they stare down the barrel of another season of possible mediocrity.

- with Ross Roche

The fifth season of the United Rugby Championship (URC) kicks off this weekend and it’s hard to see the Lions improving on what has come before - having never made the competition knockouts at the end of the season.

That is likely largely down to them doing the same thing every season.

The Lions still have mostly the same coaching group they started with when the URC launched in 2021, led by Ivan van Rooyen, while Ricardo Loubscher, Jaque Fourie, Julian Redelinghuys and Barend Pieterse have been around for a good few years.