How many rugby union players have won 2 World Cups and 2 Lions Series?

Question

François Steyn has won two World Cups and one Lions Series. He stands to be the only player ever to win two Lions series as well, or has there been any other player to achieve this?

Answer 1

The Wikipedia page List of winners of multiple Rugby World Cups unsurprisingly gives the list of all players who have won two World Cups. These can be broken down into four categories:

• 14 New Zealanders who won the World Cup in 2011 and 2015.
• 5 Australians who won the World Cup in 1991 and 1999.
• Os du Randt, who won the World Cup with South Africa in 1995 and 2007.
• Steyn.

We can now cross-reference this list with the results of the Lions tours. From this, we can rule out:

• The New Zealanders, as they would have had to have been playing against the 1993 tourists to have won two series (the 2017 series was tied 1-1-1).
• The Australians, who would have had to have played against the 2013 tourists (the Lions won the 1989 series 2-1)
• du Randt, as he would have had to have played against the 1980 tourists (the Lions won the 1997 series 2-1)
• Steyn, who needs to win in the 2021 series.

Therefore we can say that no player has won two World Cups and two Lions series. As of August 2021, this remains the case as while South Africa won the 2021 series against the Lions, François Steyn did not play; the player named Steyn who played in the 3rd test of the series was Morné Steyn, not François.