HE HAS BEEN touted as a potential contender for the role and New Zealand rugby legend Kieran Read believes that ‘powerhouse’ Caelan Doris possesses the necessary attributes to become the British & Irish Lions captain for next year’s tour to Australia.

In addition to being announced as Leinster’s new skipper for the 2024/25 club season, Doris also led Ireland into battle throughout last month’s Autumn Nations Series. While the November international window began with a disappointing 23-13 reversal at the hands of New Zealand, the Mayo native subsequently captained his country to consecutive victories over Argentina, Fiji and Australia.

Given he served as skipper of the All Blacks on no fewer than 52 occasions, Read is as well placed as anyone to assess the leadership credentials of his fellow back-rower.

“I rate him highly as a leader. I don’t know too much about how he leads, but the way I see him on the field, man he’s a powerhouse. To me he’s an 80 minute player. Every impact he has across the field is huge, it’s a positive effort. The way I see from the outside, he’s going to work as hard as anyone in that team,” Read explained.

“That’s the kind of guys you want as your leaders. If he gets that opportunity [with the Lions] I’m sure he’ll do well, but he’s certainly a player I enjoy. For him to really grab it with both hands in the last few years has been pretty cool to see.”

Doris’ most recent outing as an international captain offered up a sense of what to expect from Australia in next year’s Lions series as the Wallabies produced a strong showing before eventually losing out 22-19 to Ireland.

Although he has had more defeats than wins since he took over from Eddie Jones as head coach (six victories and seven losses from 13 tests), there is a sense that ex-Leinster and Ireland supremo Joe Schmidt is making steady progress at the Australian helm.

Read is of the opinion that his fellow New Zealander is doing a good job with the Wallabies, but admitted they still have a long way to go before they become an international force again.

“Joe Schmidt is a great coach. I had a little bit to do with him when he was back in New Zealand, but only just casually as a bit of a catch up. Australia at the moment don’t have the players yet. It has taken him a while too, but he has got them on tour to compete against you [Ireland], beat England and Wales.

“He has got a team that’s on the improve. He hasn’t got much time I guess in terms of before the Lions, but he has got that team humming. He’ll put everything he can into that series and I hope they’re competitive. That’s what you want in a series like the Lions.”

When a New Zealand team led out by Read secured a comfortable 46-14 win against Ireland at the quarter-final stage of the Rugby World Cup in 2019, a 22-year-old Jordie Barrett grabbed a late try after being introduced as a second half replacement.

He has gone on to lock horns with them on a number of occasions since then, but now Barrett finds himself counting a large chunk of the Ireland squad as his club-mates at Leinster.

Currently on a short-term deal that will see him lining out for the eastern province for the remainder of the present campaign, Barrett has settled in nicely on these shores with back-to-back tries in the European Champions Cup against Bristol and Clermont.

“Obviously he’s started pretty well, a couple of tries and had some impact already. I think Jordie is a man who will play well wherever he is. The fact that he has gone to Leinster in his period off playing for New Zealand shows to me that he’s really wanting to improve himself and get better as a player.

“He’ll learn a lot from Leinster. I’m sure the players around him will learn a lot from him too, but he’ll come back a much better player I think for the All Blacks, which is a real positive.”

Read was speaking earlier today on a media call to help announce AIB’s new content series ‘The Toughest Traits’.

The first episode of this series is due to be released on 26 December and sees the double World Cup winner spending time with inter-county footballers Jason Foley (Kerry) and Louise Ward (Galway) to learn the true meaning of what it takes to be an elite Gaelic Games player. In episode two of ‘The Toughest Traits’, Read will link up with Antrim camogie star Roisin McCormick and Dublin hurler Sean Brennan.

Having been limited to a very small part of the country when he played here in the past with the All Blacks, Read – who now operates his own performance and leadership consulting business – was delighted to travel around Ireland for this series.

“I loved it. It was a real pleasure actually to have a look and see what it was like. I’d only seen snippets. I’ve obviously been to Ireland a number of times, but you’re kind of confined to Dublin hotels. I saw snippets on TV of hurling and the football,” Read added.

“To actually get a real taste of it, I got to a couple of football games, men’s and the ladies. It was bloody exciting and just to see how much it meant to the people who are involved and obviously it’s such a kind of club, village game. It was really exciting to see.”