Eight of the Lions’ 38-man squad in Australia were born, raised and spent their whole education in the southern hemisphere before moving north.

They have taken two different routes to become eligible for England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, and therefore the British and Irish Lions.

Aki, his Ireland team-mates James Lowe and Jamison Gibson-Park, and Scotland duo Duhan van der Merwe and Pierre Schoeman all qualify for their adoptive countries on residence grounds.

When that quintet were going through the process, three years living in a country was enough to be able to represent it.

Lowe played for the Maori All Blacks against the British and Irish Lions in 2017, before switching to Irish province Leinster later that year, aged 25.

Gibson-Park, who played for the Maoris against Leicester Tigers earlier in his career, had made the same switch the year before at the age of 24.

Both made their Ireland debuts shortly after passing three years in Dublin.

Aki has previously admitted that qualifying for Ireland and stepping up to the Test game was a big part of the motivation behind his own move to Connacht from New Zealand in 2014.

Van der Merwe and Schoeman both played for South Africa’s under-20 team before signing for Edinburgh and, after serving their time there, qualifying for Scotland.