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14th July 2025
09:23am BST
Hugo Keenan has long had ambitions of becoming a British & Irish Lion, but his time in Australia has been far from the dream he envisioned.
The Leinster full-back traveled with the Lions nursing an injury that had ruled him out of the latter stages of the URC, before being struck by a stomach virus shortly after arriving.
He pulled out of the win against the Reds on July 2, looked off the pace in the win over Waratahs on July 5, and looked to have fallen behind Blair Kinghorn in the battle for the No 15 jersey.
But last week, Kinghorn suffered a knee injury, and Keenan began to recover, shaking off symptoms after nearly two weeks of illness.
“It wasn’t exactly what you planned on when getting on tour. I was sick for about 12 days. I couldn’t stop, yeah … getting off the jacks was an issue. I lost about five or six kilos,” Keenan revealed.
“It was a rough few weeks. I definitely felt better out there on Saturday than last week. It [struck me] the week before the Waratahs game, we were still over in Perth. There was a little bit of a virus going around camp but for whatever reason, it hit me on a different level.
“I was isolating for a good bit and then, most lads recovered pretty quick from it, but I’ve never had something like that. God, it was pretty horrible.
“Just frustrating. Every day you think you’re going to be waking up the next day better. You think it’s going to be sort of a 24-hour, 48-hour thing.
“So, it was just frustrating the length of time that it kept on going but we got a few tests done. I only found out what bug I had a day or two ago. It’s been going on that long.
“But look, that’s hopefully in the past now. Yeah, even over the last 48 hours, [I’ve] made big, big improvements.
“The tour will hopefully kick on for me here and I can start enjoying it a bit more.”
The Lions face Australia in the first Test on Saturday in Brisbane, before Tests in Melbourne and Sydney the following two Saturdays.
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