James O’Connor has finally lifted the lid on one of the most infamous incidents in Wallabies history, when he and Kurtley Beale were caught out at Hungry Jack’s at nearly 4am during the week of a Lions Test, that ultimately saw coach Robbie Deans sacked.

The scandal was used to point out a deep cultural malaise in the Wallabies squad that, along with failure in the 2011 World Cup and record defeat to the Lions in the third Test that saw the visitors claim a 2-1 series win, saw Deans replaced by Ewen McKenzie as Wallabies coach.

O’Connor and Beale were heavily criticised over their behaviour and contribution to the team’s slide, but after 12 years of silence, O’Connor has broken his silence to say the pair did not consume a drop of alcohol that night.

“That tour was a dry tour,” O’Connor said. “We all agreed that maybe for six or seven weeks we won’t drink. No one will have any drinks, and we stuck to that. We didn’t drink.”

This commitment to abstinence was a collective decision by the Wallabies squad, and O’Connor maintains they adhered to it throughout.

Their late-night excursion was, for him, a carefully planned moment of leisure within a demanding schedule.

“For us it was like, again, I was young, but Tuesday night was Wednesday’s off, so Tuesday night was our night to almost have a bit of fun,” O’Connor said.

“The Rebels played that night, so we went and watched that team play, me and Kurtley, and then we went out with them after.

“We didn’t want to wake our roomies up because we knew it was 3am. So we went to Hungry Jack’s to get a burger and then go home. In hindsight, a rookie error – you don’t go to bed at 3am.”

Then came the 3.50am moment that would haunt them. “So firstly a guy asked for a photo, he asked for a photo with him and his kid and we’re like, ‘Yeah, we’ll get a photo’.”

The man posted the photo on his Facebook page.

The perception was that he had passed it directly to the media, leading to initial bitterness from O’Connor and Beale. However, the truth emerged later.

“It actually worked out that the guy’s ex-girlfriend, her brother is a journalist and got the photo of his Facebook,” O’Connor said.

The Wallabies went on to win the second Test 16-15 in Melbourne despite the pair’s late-night antics.

O’Connor and Beale were forced to front the rest of the squad.

“I felt cheated, because it was like we were asked to apologise, but I didn’t understand what I was apologising for,” he said. “What have I actually done wrong here? There’s no curfew, I haven’t broken a curfew. OK, I’ve been out late, but I didn’t understand that was such a big deal.

“No one even asked us if we’d been drinking.

“Of course people are going to be pissed off. This is a Lions series, everyone else was bloody asleep.

“It looks like we didn’t care and especially to our teammates as well. They probably thought we’d had some drinks as well.

“I wasn’t actually sorry for what I did. So they would have felt that maybe I wasn’t actually sorry because I just felt like I was apologising just as a token. Yeah, ‘Sorry, but really I’m not sorry because I felt like I haven’t done anything wrong’.”

But following their 41-16 humiliation in the Sydney decider, the photo was published widely, and a narrative was drawn that Deans no longer had control of his players.

“That one I tried not to read into too much because that I felt pretty shit, to be honest,” O’Connor said.

“There was a string of things, I’d never done anything crazy or there was no malice in what I’d done, but I definitely let him down quite a few times – and the team down quite a few times.

“I didn’t even have the emotional awareness to know that what I was doing was hurting the group because it was all just about me and I’m like, ‘Well, I’m not doing it to hurt anyone. I’m just having a bit of fun myself. What’s the problem?’

“When you can take your blinkers off, you can understand the world a little bit more.

“Robbie instilled so many little seeds of wisdom in me that I had no idea until maybe 10 years later, where I was like, ‘Oh, OK, I see what he said here. That was pretty insightful. I get that. Geez, if only I could understand that back then or listened, it would have been different here, definitely a different outcome on a lot of things’.”

One of Deans’ most impactful lessons revolved around the role of a five-eighth, which O’Connor was chosen to play for the first time in Tests in the Lions series.

“He told me being 10 means you serve the team,” O’Connor said.

“I didn’t know, like ‘What do you mean serve the team, am I not serving the team by making breaks and whatnot?’ I didn’t understand, how do you serve the team? It wasn’t even a thought I would have to serve others before yourself. Does anyone do that? Is that even possible?

“As a young guy didn’t even think people would actually do that. I’d always assume I want the best for my team, but I want the best for me first, like my first priority is me and then it’s the team and if I sort myself out first and I play the best game I can play, then that’s me playing well for the team.”

Only in recent years has O’Connor’s perspective changed.

“Serving the team first is me putting the team in the right parts of the field, and sometimes I won’t look good, but I’ve served the team and we’re winning and that’s the main thing,” O’Connor said.

“Instead of me just doing what’s going to be good for me – and maybe it’ll be good for the team. Like if I make a break, but hey, it was on over here, I’ve stepped seven people, gone nowhere, I could have shifted the ball here or put a kick in, and it doesn’t look flashy, but that’s a better outcome because our forwards are stuffed and now they’ve had to chase me across the field and hit a breakdown and we got turned over.”

O’Connor’s growth as a player is highlighted when he reflects on a brutal assessment made by former Lions player Ronan O’ Gara after the Wallabies’ defeat.

“He said, ‘Yeah, the Lions beat the Wallabies, but O’Connor was 10 so it doesn’t count almost,” he said.

“I can see what he meant now because I was so raw, fresh. I didn’t actually know it.”