Gavin Hastings and George Gregan discuss the British & Irish Lions tour

With the British & Irish Lions tour of Hong Kong and Australia less than three months away, a legend from each camp sat down with James Porteous to talk about the series. Gavin Hastings, perhaps the best Scottish player of all time, played in two series for the Lions, winning 2-1 in Australia in 1989 and then captaining the tourists in 1993, when they lost 2-1 to New Zealand. George Gregan has made more appearances for Australia than any other player, and played in the 2001 series when the home team won 2-1.

It's been talked about for a while and I think the Six Nations results have just added another level of excitement and expectation. Tickets sold out in about 15 minutes so they're going to be playing in front of full houses, and the quality of rugby should be excellent. I think the way Wales played will be a blueprint for the way the Lions play, that's the way [coach] Warren Gatland likes to play. It's going to be a tantalising series, I think it'll go down to the final test in Sydney.

What you have to understand, 24 years ago I went on the first full Lions tour to Australia and there's only been one since, so these guys, if they're very lucky, will only get one chance to play the Lions in their whole career. From a British and Irish point of view you get the chance to go on tour on more than one occasion and Brian O'Driscoll potentially could go on four, which is extraordinary.

Interestingly, both teams who lost the first test in the two previous tours in 1989 and 2001 went on to win the remaining two games back-to-back, which is very, very difficult to do.

From a Lions perspective, coming from four different countries the challenge is to mould a team and try to find the guys that work together, to challenge Australia, who have played together for potentially five or six years.

Warren Gatland made a very interesting point at a dinner in New York a few weeks ago, he said on balance the Lions should never have a chance of winning. Teams like Australia, South Africa and New Zealand have been together for years and this is a collection of guys with different playing styles and backgrounds - in theory they should never have a chance.