A visit to Australia by the British & Irish Lions always offers former Wallaby Jim Williams an opportunity to reflect, both on his experience of playing against the tourists and the doors it opened for a career-defining move to Munster.
It is 24 years ago that Williams captained a Brumbies side including Stephen Larkham against a Lions team featuring Munster icons and soon-to-be clubmates Ronan O’Gara and David Wallace and then tasted victory over Graham Henry’s 2001 tourists in an Australia A jersey. Two months later, having been overlooked for the Test series after 14 caps and a place in the 1999 World Cup-winning squad, the No.8 was making his debut in red in a pre-season friendly for Declan Kidney’s side at Musgrave Park against London Irish.
Williams played 74 times for Munster, became the province’s captain before transitioning to an assistant coach under Kidney in the historic 2005-06 season at the end of which the Heineken Cup was lifted for the first time.
By the time he left for home to take up the same role with the Wallabies at the end of the 2007-08, “Seamus” was a Munster icon in his own right and now 56 he has not forgotten the impact his seven years in Ireland has made on him.
Williams is no longer involved in rugby, choosing lifestyle over coaching professionally with a career change to a government job and moving south of Sydney to Woolongong. Yet the 2025 Lions tour drew him back in once more, if only from his sofa.
“It’s been excellent,” he told the before settling down for the final Test last Saturday. “I mean I love the Lions tours, doesn’t matter where they are and where they’re playing, it’s always something that I try not to miss.”
Playing against the 2001 Lions was a significant moment for Williams.
“It was my first introduction to Ronan O’Gara and guys like that. It certainly holds special memories, and the game down in Canberra (with the Brumbies) was excellent.
“We got really close to beating them that night, great atmosphere, and all those special memories certainly of that Lions tour when they came out in 2001.
“And I joined Munster straight after that Lions tour.”
Williams credits a young adult life as an amateur player for helping him to settle so successfully at Munster. He joined the Australian Army at 17, also worked as a plumber and had a season in English club rugby at West Hartlepool in the mid-nineties.
“I didn’t play professional rugby until I was 30, with the Brumbies. I suppose that might have helped a little bit, being a little bit more mature, and moving with my partner at the time wasn’t a big deal because it was the two of us.
“So it wasn’t a massive move, but I certainly did take the time, and I had a lot of advice from John Langford at the time about Munster.
“I did have a few other offers in France and I just thought basically going to an English-speaking place over in Europe was probably on my mind.
“And the fact that it was Munster and John Langford had been there and had raved about it an had been so well accepted and had been successful himself, it really wasn’t an issue about where I was going to go after that.
“It was always going to be Munster from there on in, and certainly it worked out that way. It was just a wonderful time of my life.”
For Munster supporters, memories of Williams the powerful ball carrier and tackler with excellent leadership qualities tend to stand out, yet the man himself equally cherishes the dressing room camaraderie he felt as a player and his time as a coach under Kidney, when the province finally lifted the Heineken Cup.
“Winning those from a coaching perspective, my first year of coaching and having the likes of Declan Kidney back and that kind of thing, that was wonderful from that perspective. And to be able to do it in 2008 as well, that was very special.
“Obviously as a player, you always want to win those titles, but I think from a coaching perspective, it was extremely rewarding.
“It’s not easy to go from a playing environment to a coaching environment, especially with guys that you’ve just done so much with.
“As a player, I just had the right environment around me, I had the right coaching, I had the right players, and the right support outside of rugby as well to be able to succeed while I was there.
“I can’t pick out one game. I mean, people pick out the Gloucester game, the Miracle game and all that kind of thing but I think every time I got on the pitch with those boys, the likes of Ronan O’Gara, Paul O’Connell, Donncha O’Callaghan, Anthony Horgan, those type of guys, it was always something that I was going to try my best at.
“I didn’t need to think about it. I didn’t need to do anything different from what I normally do. I did the work during the week and I knew all these boys would.
“You didn’t always win games, things didn’t always work out, but I knew the effort was always there and I think that was probably the most enjoyable thing from a playing perspective.
“I always knew these guys were always going to put it in every time they went out and from a coaching perspective, I think to coach that and see that from outside was just as rewarding.
“I suppose just the experience that I had playing with the guys and being able to coach them, I think it’s probably the most special thing that I can take away from my time at Munster.
“I had success playing with them. I probably had more success being part of the coaching staff and being able to be a part of those two titles that we got, I think it was just wonderful. It’s just something that I’ll never forget.”
Williams thinks Australia should send more of their players overseas to experience different environments, conditions and team cultures and cites Will Skelton’s current spell under O’Gara at La Rochelle as a prime example of the benefits to Wallaby rugby. And he cited his only visit to the redeveloped Thomond Park with the Australians on the November tour of 2016 as the perfect example of a collective lack of experience as Munster defeated the touring Wallabies 15-6 on a typically wild cold and stormy winter’s night in Limerick.
“I’ve been back to the stadium once with Australia which wasn’t a happy hunting ground That was a wild night. I’ve seen conditions like that before and I wasn’t surprised.
“The team that went out that night, the coaches that went out that night, the looks on their faces, they hadn’t been a part of conditions like that.
“I had no illusions about the conditions that were going to happen and full credit to Munster that game, they just played the conditions perfectly and that’s more or less what won them the game and they thoroughly deserved it.
“That’s the beauty about playing overseas and going overseas and playing. Obviously playing in different countries but playing in different environments and playing in different conditions.
“You’ve got the likes of Nic White who have come back and guys like Will Skelton who I think is a better player for the fact of playing overseas and understanding what it’s like to play in different conditions and different arenas and different styles of football.
“It should be a wonderful learning experience to go overseas with the Wallabies on the Spring tours. Yes, they want to play and they want to play well and they want to win but they want to learn from those aspects about playing overseas and playing in different conditions and weather that’s not conducive to running rugby and adjusting your game and adjusting the mentality about what you do and how you do things to win games.
“It’s certainly an honour playing over in Europe and playing in different conditions and it’s just something that I’m so glad I did, when I had the opportunity to do it. It was one of the best decisions I ever made.”
