THE BRITISH and Irish Lions have an opportunity to erase Rustenburg from their short-term memory at Ellis Park tonight. To do so they will need to produce a cohesive performance underpinned by ruthless precision in executing their patterns and a physicality that they managed only intermittingly against the Royal XV at the weekend.

Every facet of their game needs to improve appreciably – set-piece, defence, handling, spatial awareness, lines of running and punting. All this must be done with a largely new team, 12 of whom will have had brief or no exposure to the demands of the high veldt.

Training drills cannot ape match intensity for fear of injury. The tourists have had their fill of those at this point. So no matter how much coach Ian McGeechan and his assistants claim to have addressed the shortcomings of the last day, the sole arbiter will be the display produced tonight in Johannesburg.

The Scot has chosen an experienced team led by Ireland’s Grand Slam captain Brian O’Driscoll with several units within the side that boast Test-match potential. That in itself puts huge pressure on the visiting side because to lose against the Golden Lions would be a significant setback, not simply because of a defeat but with wider ramifications for the Test series against South Africa.

The local team finished 12th in the Super 14 tournament, winning just four matches. Three of those were achieved against the Reds and Cheetahs who finished second last and last respectively while a third came against the Highlanders who finished one place above the Johannesburg franchise.

The Golden Lions managed just a single success outside of the bottom four teams and that came against the seventh-placed Brumbies. Last week they sacked their coach Eugene Eloff – several senior players spoke of boycotting this match in support of him – and they must take the field tonight without a number of front-line players including a brace of former Springboks, secondrow Jannes Labuschagne and prop Heinke van der Merwe.

The Golden Lions may have lost a little bit of their lustre in recent weeks given the internal upheaval but it will be put aside at Ellis Park tonight. The opportunity to take on their Northern Hemisphere cousins roared on by a passionately one-eyed crowd is likely to super-charge the home players adrenaline-wise; at least initially.

The British and Irish Lions need to dissuade and deflate their opponents from referee Craig Joubert’s opening whistle. It’ll be an intensely physical debate if forwards’ coach Warren Gatland has his way. “We need to be more physical. Physically players in the Northern Hemisphere are as good if not better than the Southern Hemisphere.

“It is about getting used to the intensity and the tempo that the Southern Hemisphere sides are used to. It is all about the collisions and the intensity of those collisions. The breakdown is so important. Here you see guys accelerating into the breakdown and cleaning people out. They get low and are really aggressive.

“We did not do that well enough on Saturday and we have to improve dramatically in that area. That is my challenge. We have to keep saying to the guys that every collision is 100 per cent. That is the only way we have a chance of getting on the front foot and getting some quality ball.”

They certainly possess the quality behind the scrum to translate that into points from the Welsh halfbacks to the speed and physicality of wings Ugo Monye and Tommy Bowe. The centre partnership of Jamie Roberts and O’Driscoll is already being enthused about inside and outside the camp. To make best use of the Welshman’s line-breaking facility the support needs to be on his shoulder, something which O’Driscoll alluded to.

Rob Kearney’s thumping left boot and safety under the high ball will be important qualities. He’s bound to be nervous but has been encouraged to discharge the basic duties first and foremost. Former England captain Phil Vickery offers a streetwise presence and will lead a pack that is long on athleticism.

Tom Croft, Jamie Heaslip and David Wallace, the latter happily restored to the number seven jersey, all have excellent skill sets and are capable of carrying close in or roaming a little further afield.

Alun Wyn-Jones has to bring mental toughness to his physical qualities but will benefit from the throwing precision of Lee Mears.

The visitors have worked hard on defending the maul, an Achilles heel from the weekend, and will hope for a fair crack from Joubert at scrum-time, something they didn’t receive the last day. The Lions have identified a number of key players for the home side outside of Springboks, Andre Pretorius and Lawrence Sephaka.

Number eight Willem Alberts, scrumhalf Jano Vermaak and centres Doppies la Grange and the wonderfully named Jannie Boshoff have caught the eye. Today is the visitors’ ninth day on the high veldt and the accepted wisdom is that players fully acclimatise after eight; the altitude effect can be crossed from the list of excuses.

They won’t want to make any and probably won’t have to provided they have absorbed the lessons of Rustenburg and recalibrated their patterns. McGeechan’s men to be the Lion kings of Johannesburg; for one night anyway.