Former Lions John Bentley believes it is "naive" to think players will no longer write diaries on future tours.

Bentley was part of the victorious 1997 trip to South Africa, taking on the role of social secretary and ensuring it was one of the most harmonious tours in rugby history. He was also responsible for producing the much-acclaimed 'Living with the Lions' video, a fly-on-the-wall account of the trip which gave an inside account of players' lives on tour and which England supremo Clive Woodward has strongly criticised.

"There was a lot of argument when Graham Henry was chosen as coach, but he was the man in charge and you would like to think the players respected him," said Bentley, who reached the top in both rugby codes. "Sadly, that doesn't appear to be the case.

"Players who didn't think they were going to be in the Test team have broken ranks and started to air their gripes in public. These comments immediately get faxed back to Australia and it causes problems.

"Keeping a harmonious atmosphere is essential to the success of any tour. But it hardly helps if you start reading articles in which players are slagging each other, or the coaches, off.

"But it is naive to think you can just stop this by preventing people doing columns or books or videos. If people are being gagged that is hardly healthy either."

Bentley claimed he took England manager Clive Woodward's criticism of players taking advantage of the modern media "quite personally".

But he added: "When I thought about it, everybody really enjoyed participating in the Lions video. It was actually one of the things which gelled us together."

He also believes there was one big advantage that the 1997 squad had over their 2001 counterparts - the players were responsible for disciplining themselves.

"When we first met up, we drew up a code of conduct between ourselves which everyone had to abide by," he said. "If anyone stepped out of line, the players dealt with it. It was quite a strict regime but it was a really happy tour.

"I suppose the thing that confuses me most is that a lot of the guys who went to South Africa in 1997 were also in Australia, yet things seemed to have been so different.

"You do take your lead from the management but you can't pin all the blame on Graham Henry."