Brian O’Driscoll may have been at the eye of the pre-match storm - and the potential launching pad for a thousand column inches of anti-Warren Gatland vitriol in the event of a Lions failure - but following this morning’s victory he was keen to stress his delight at finally having a Lions series win on his CV.

Interviewed after the game by Sky Sports O’Driscoll admitted regret that he had not been involved in the final test, but the overall test win – an honour that was sorely lacking from his career highlights until today – was what counted.

“Obviously I’m absolutely delighted. It’s been a rollercoaster week, you know with the emotion of today sitting through it not being there but essentially it’s about winning a series. I’ve been part of that, albeit not in the deciding test, but I’ll always have it on my cv and that’s what counts,” O’Driscoll said.

“We won the series and any of the negatives that might have been felt throughout the tour will have been forgotten about,” he added.

Jonathan Sexton was one of the Lions try scorers, breaking through the Wallabies defence in the second half to heap misery upon the hosts. Following the game the Lions number 10 spoke of the desire amongst the players to win the series for the injured Paul O’Connell and the dropped O’Driscoll.

Sexton told Sky Sports: “We wanted to do it for Paul, with injury and then obviously for Brian to miss out. I was so disappointed for him, I felt like I’d been dropped myself. We wanted to win it for him and send him off in the best way possible”