Potent Pommies pulverise imperfect All Blacks
1 Dec 2012
MARK KEOHANE writes that England, at least until the teams next meet, are in the penthouse and all of New Zealand’s rugby world champions will be made to feel like home for the next six months is closer to the shithouse.
England won a Test that was more a non contest 38-21 and they won it in a manner surely only their players could have believed was possible.
England also ensured international rugby remains a game of hope for those who play the All Blacks and not merely an opportunity for the game’s self proclaimed Messiah to deliver an exhibition of the supposed idealism of the game.
The rugby gods have a way of ensuring this is a game meant for mortals that appreciate the triumph and fallibility of mortals. New Zealand, in recent weeks, bemoaned the imperfection of their mortal performances and turned their attention to an indulgent and self-absored inner search for rugby immortality.
It was painful to listen to how no win was good enough as the game’s best players bemoaned their vulnerability in making mistakes, but it will never be as painful as the beating inflicted on them by an England team apparently lacking in ambition, belief and of inferior playing pedigree.
The All Blacks, strained at the continued imperfections of every Test victory, spoke of finishing the year with the perfect performance but got only to know the feeling of a non-performance.
No English team has ever been as uncharitable, brutal and belittling when hosting the All Blacks. How wonderfully entertaining of the English to finally show some mongrel and to do it with a poise more befitting of the pending immortals wearing black.
England played as if sent by the gods to remind the All Blacks that reward comes from beating the opposition and not the romantic notion of a perfect rugby performance.
Playing the perfect game will never be possible, but the All Blacks who took a beating at Twickenham will know there is something like the most painful game.
Celebrate England and smile. The result was perfect, which is very different to a performance assessed on a belief that it has to be perfect.
The sport needed this result as much as the All Blacks needed a reminder that beating the opposition is still the greater reward and reason to play the game than the self indulgent notion that victory comes not in who they beat but in their ability to play the perfect game.
Players, who have made New Zealand the best team in the world in the last 20 months, will never know what it feels like to be perfect in 80 minutes of Test rugby, but they certainly will speak with authority about how it feels to be pulverised and made to feel pedestrian, pathetic and pulverised.
England, expected to play with passion but no poise, precision or perfection, were ruthless, adventurous and never reckless in taking the game’s champs and for 80 minutes treating them like chumps.
The hosts, heroic and inspirational, led 15-0 at half-time in the most emphatic domination of the All Blacks in the history of the two teams. Don’t belittle what England achieved. Not since Jonny Wilkinson kicked the most famous drop goal in English rugby to win England the 2003 World Cup has a nation had as much reason to feel so bloody good on a Saturday night after a Test match.
This was never a contest. In the context of the 80 minutes New Zealand were fortunate not to concede 50 points.
It would do every England player a disservice to speak of New Zealand player fatigue as the reason for the defeat, and it would also do England a disservice to want to read anything beyond the 80 minutes into the performance.
This match needs to celebrated for a result that balances the world order, even if only temporarily, but more importantly for 80 of the finest minutes in England’s professional rugby history.
It reminded me of Buster Douglas knocking out Mike Tyson as among sport’s greatest upsets. The more the England backs trampled over the limp New Zealand defence, the more surreal it seemed. It was a beating of the most emphatic nature and it showed what is possible in any one-off contest where adventure and belief match the physicality and commitment.
New Zealand in the professional era average just over one Test defeat a year. This was it. The unbeaten Test run of 20 ended with a knockout, but it was the All Blacks who were floored. Ultimately it may prove that the most humiliating of defeats proves the most inspiring of results in the push for a successful defence of the World Cup in 2015.
England’s win was their first against the All Blacks and Springboks in 20 Tests so there is no crisis in New Zealand rugby and there certainly should not be any talk just yet of England being world champions in 2015.
Celebrate what is possible when it all comes together for a team in 80 minutes. Call it magnificent and don’t be shy in using every bit of purple praise to commend a performance and a result that is a contradiction of the player pedigree of the sides and certainly of the results in the last two seasons.
England’s players will believe it is possible to win, even against the might of the All Blacks. And New Zealand’s finest will know it is possible to lose, even against a youthful England.
Twickenham on Saturday will be mentioned every time a team is dismissed as a challenger to the world’s best in New Zealand. It will also be the reminder to every All Black player and every New Zealand supporter that if the professional game’s two greatest players Richie McCaw and Dan Carter could so decisively be pummeled in 80 minutes, no match can be assumed safe on the basis of the black jersey and previous performances.
New Zealand produce the quality of England’s finest moment since 2003 three matches in four. Their domination of the game and standards of excellence often mean that their finest matches are not given the necessary accolades because of all the talk of playing the perfect game.
Perhaps New Zealand’s public will again appreciate what constitutes a fine All Blacks win because they again know what it feels like to be humiliated on at least one Saturday in the Test calendar year.
I expect there to be humility in the post match talk from both camps. England will talk of the need to back up this type of all-round win against the very best and deliver consistently in big tournaments. New Zealand can’t but acknowledge this was a day in which they g0t whipped in every aspect of the game.
New Zealand’s 2011 World Cup-winning squad peaked with the most decisive last 40 minutes against the Springboks at Soccer City. It was a match that defined the quality of the world champions. Twickenham will be the start of a building towards a younger side for New Zealand. That is not a bad thing because what Saturday showed is that if the legs are not there no amount of wisdom, experience of historical brilliance can guarantee a winning result.
England were passionate in everything they did, accurate, clinical and crushingly brutal in the collisions. The result and the flow of the game would have surprised no-one had the winners being wearing black.
Give England their due. On this particular Saturday, All Blacks wingers Cory Jane and Julian Savea were as good as they have been all year. For the rest England won at the scrum, the lineout, field position, ball possession and most importantly in every collision. They advanced metres. The men in black were manhandled and carried back with as much ferocity.
The black jersey is again the cape of mortals. Hooray for that.
The 2015 World Cup again has an appeal. Nothing can ever be taken as a given when World Cup glory is determined in 80 minutes.
England have players capable of playing rugby as it was meant to be played. New Zealand, the bench mark of excellence, have players capable of taking a beating. The challenger played with the authority of the champion and the champion with the confusion and bewilderment of a mere pretender taking a pounding.
Take away the identities of the players and the two teams and reflect on the rugby. It was deserving of a standing ovation.
England believed and the All Blacks were never given a chance to not believe. The blows, all legal, were landed in the first collisions and sustained for the duration of the contest. New Zealand were never in this game and the momentum was always with those blokes in white.
England flanker Tom Wood was named Man of the Match but centre Manu Tualigi will remember this day as the one in which greats were made to look like greying pensioners. England’s triumph was New Zealand’s humiliation.
Carter played with the hesitation of a general who wasn’t fit enough to be in battle. Not even the finest are exempt if the mind knows the body is bleeding. Not even the greatest of them all McCaw could match the intensity of England, individually or collectively.
The All Blacks, beaten up for 50 minutes, countered with a flurry that historically would have be followed by a fundamental lesson that this is a team that can be dazed but never regarded defeated. Jane’s footwork and fighting qualities inspired 14 points.
England, 15 points clear and on the rampage, suddenly led by a point and the assumption was the last 20 minutes would be theirs by default more than design. Every other opponent has imploded at the ease with which an hour of control is undone within three minutes.
England’s players, unlike every other opponent in the last 18 months, simply played with greater adventure in response to New Zealand’s terrific two-try cameo and scored a brilliant try of their own. The confidence of England led to more chaos within New Zealand and the reality of circumstance for once proved more influential and defining than the mystique of the might of the black jersey.
England believed they could not lose. The All Blacks knew this was a day they could not win. They were courageous in trying to summon something but England’s reward for refusing to succumb to history and play the situation on merit was the most comprehensive English win in the history of battles between the two countries.
There was nothing fortunate about the win, but there was something particularly fabulous. England played the near perfect blend of rugby New Zealand talks about, in appreciation for width but with precision and not recklessness, in respect of 80 minutes and not 60 and with regard to an opponent who never lacked in desire but never threatened to terrorise.
This was a day when England looked like a team of wonderfully conditioned international rugby players and New Zealand looked bemused, battered and beaten by the refusal of a team to be beaten by a jersey worn by players who had not lost in 18 months, but who on the day were taken a beating.
The best team won at Twickenham on the basis of 80 minutes. Enjoy it England because while no one can say it will be a once in a 100 performance against the world’s best it certainly was a once in 20.
As for New Zealand it was a once in 21 defeat.
Perspective? Not just yet.
All of England deserve to boast about this one. It was that kind of demolition job.
And all of New Zealand should replace the patronising talk of the All Blacks being a team in search of playing the perfect game to a team that was painfully pulverised in their last game.
Perspective? Not for the weekend at least.
744 Comments
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3 Dec 2012, 12:19 pm
This was by far the most nonsensical column I have ever read by Keo. It is like he wanted to make a point somewhere in there.
3 Dec 2012, 12:57 pm
Guys what happens next year with the June tours. Are the French comming to SA, or will it be the Italians? Also who will tour against the Argies and All Blacks? We all know that Aus will be involved in the B&I tour. Any ideas?
3 Dec 2012, 12:58 pm
@rossoneri-702:
French 3 tests in NZ.
3 Dec 2012, 13:00 pm
@rossoneri-702:
We have Scotland, Italy and one other as far as I know
3 Dec 2012, 13:01 pm
Is this the intelligent up to date thread on this blog site because if one takes a gander at the recent comments portfolio seems some bloggers are still pretty much stuck in a hore fest extravaganza of ultra intelligent grown up adult pursuits
3 Dec 2012, 13:16 pm
seems not
seems the levels of adult intelligence on this web site gravitate toward some inane pursuit of blogging supremacy on a dead and buried thread already more than a week old
oh well I guess one can be forgiven for thinking that adults actually posted here.
3 Dec 2012, 13:18 pm
@nortierd-704: Surely Scotland is part of the B&I tour to Australia?
3 Dec 2012, 13:19 pm
@rossoneri-707:
Yes, but only a few players from each of the home Unions are selected.
The rest will tour.
Some NH teams will probably tour Argentina as well
3 Dec 2012, 13:20 pm
@skopdiekan-706:
Not much on the news front to talk about.
Pretty quiet couple of days
3 Dec 2012, 13:34 pm
@PissAnt-701:
was about to post same thing untill i saw your post. think we should aplaud him for getting paid for this rubbish.
3 Dec 2012, 13:38 pm
hurricane – Memories of the 99RWC Semi tee hee!!! I hope this loss hurts the entire Island tee hee.
BY the way how the emotional help lines in New Zealand, running off the hook?
3 Dec 2012, 13:40 pm
Hurriance – Ha ha ha the French are coming to rape your island once more, memories of 94!!! (TEE HEE FLIPPIN HEE)
3 Dec 2012, 14:11 pm
@Hurricane-653: Morning Hurricane, on this note I reckon the AB’s need to look at 2,4 and 5. You guys have great props and brilliant loose forwards but are possibly thin at hooker and lock. Dane Coles doesn’t seem test quality to me and Hore/Meealamu are ending their careers. I also think Brad Thorn leaving left a big hole at no 4.
3 Dec 2012, 14:16 pm
@mamma_lou-710:
I think he was drunk when he wrote this, he keeps repeating himself.
3 Dec 2012, 14:19 pm
@PissAnt-714: he was defo drunk or high.
but one thing is for sure, he was loving every minute of it.
3 Dec 2012, 15:44 pm
What a weekend for New Zealand?
1st – England destroys them and then losing to Samoa in the 7s.
It will take real character to bounce back from this.
Times are tough – Proteas later this month, so it will not get any easier…
3 Dec 2012, 16:20 pm
@Sheriff-716: On the bright side, it gives us our first chance to play the yeah-but-who-won-the-world-cup card. Surprisingly, it isn’t as much consolation as I was expecting
3 Dec 2012, 17:15 pm
@race of tan-712: TEE HEE still buoyed by remembering all the fat snivelling bitter bokke pricks crying into their cans of castle in Soweto TEE FLIPPING HEE
3 Dec 2012, 19:20 pm
It is indeed a kuk article
4 Dec 2012, 04:32 am
@race of tan-711:
@race of tan-712:
What the heck is this person?
Are you 5 years old?
Fkn tee hee??
4 Dec 2012, 04:33 am
@Sheriff-716:
How do you guys do it Sheriff?
4 Dec 2012, 08:29 am
@bokke baiter-718: I see all you dumb arseeee keeeeweeees are all of a sudden using your own name in you posts know,snivellers.Try and be a little bit original.We would rather drink castle than that pisswater red,speights,db that you knoob jockeys drink down there in the backwater that you come from.Watch out all women of nz,THE KEEEEWEEEEEE males pride has been dented and there will be a backlash by the gumboot wearing retards.Go into hiding now.
4 Dec 2012, 08:33 am
@Hurricane-721:
Losing is never nice, but everyone has to admit the Poms put on a masterclass and beat us at our own game.
I feel less hurt losing like that than if we had been strangled in some boring mistake laden slug fest and then grasped at endless what ifs to explain away it could have been a different result.
NZ lost to a team that was far better on the day, end of story.
4 Dec 2012, 08:54 am
@Brads-723: Well put.
Surely Heyneke will have to look at the Poms’ performance as a blueprint for how he wants the boks to play. Strong forward play and clever runs outwide that lead to a comprehensive win over the most consistent team in World Rugby.
This has to be the ultimate case against his kick-and-chase game plan = winning rugby philosophy.
4 Dec 2012, 09:05 am
@DumbSupporter-724:
Exactly.
The Poms are in exactly the same rebuild situation as SA, so there is no reason why Meyer should be excused for the results he has achieved.
4 Dec 2012, 09:08 am
Maybe the Boks must start wearing the Protea top . This should give them the same mythical powers that the AB top grants mediocre players . It is tiresome seeing players like Nonu , Smith , Hore and co being lauded as greats when they take regular beatings from our Super rugby teams . It is time to look at the All Blacks as what they are , a team of players who are afforded too much respect because of being tied to a perception that a black jersey contains some kind of mythical power .
It is time that we treated them with the same kind of disdain that the Proteas treat the Ozzies with .
4 Dec 2012, 09:26 am
@Brads-725: Just to keep things in perspective, I think we have to take the stomach bug the team had into consideration.
Anyone who has had gastro (not sure what exactly the ABs were fighting during the week) will know that physically you are far below your best.
I am sure this had something to do with their poor performance. I mean seriously, the boks beat England the week before with some horrendous rugby and one week later the poms look invincible.
4 Dec 2012, 09:28 am
@spooky-726:
I find it sad the way a few weak willed morons need to clutch onto wins by any team that play the AB’s or in the case of the Protea’s, a completely different sporting code, just to get some vicarious relief from the beatings your current batch of heroes are being dealt.
4 Dec 2012, 09:30 am
@DumbSupporter-727: Yes, you are right… However it just amazes me that the all the bright spark Kiwi Doctors and Nurses still haven’t found a cure or vaccine for this stomach affliction that strikes low their biggest National Asset from time to time and from time immemorial… Especially in the weeks leading to historic losses…
4 Dec 2012, 09:32 am
@DumbSupporter-727:
Perhaps, but they have dismissed the stomach bug issue and I accept that.
What happened here is the AB’s were simply not prepared for the game the Poms turned up with. Not quite an ambush, but no one expected them to play like they did and they took full advantage.
Whether the Poms could pull off a similar effort if it was a two plus match series is another story altogether.
4 Dec 2012, 09:39 am
@Heavens Game-729:
Quite right, medical marvels have eluded us.
How is the coaching marvels going for you guys, do you need a hand yet, or are you going to tough it out for a few more disappointments?
Surely it time to call in an Aussie or a bit of inspiration from someone outside the team isn’t it?
4 Dec 2012, 09:45 am
@Brads-730: I appreciate you not using it as an excuse – very noble.
I am still not convinced. England was so bad the week before that the SA public gave the boks very little recognition for beating them at home. One way for them to suddenly ‘dominate the All Blacks in the collisions’ was if the ABs were physically not 100%.
Yes, the Poms could have been galvanised by the criticism that they had to take leading up to the game. But the ease with which the poms dealt with the NZ physically points towards them not being 100%.
4 Dec 2012, 09:49 am
I would love the game to prove that the ABs can also have a bad game as it gives us hope that they can be beaten on the day.
But this just seems to good to be true. And then it ussually is.
4 Dec 2012, 09:59 am
@DumbSupporter-732:
Who will ever know for sure, but the end result was England pitched up against the AB’s and dealt to us.
No one is offering excuses and nor should they. England deserve their day in the sun.
However, I do not believe they would have it in them for a repeat performance if a second match was played this weekend.
Which is why I am not reacting to the loss as if it was a watershed event.
4 Dec 2012, 10:05 am
@DumbSupporter-732: I tend to agree. I know how i feel after I’ve had a bug and the last thing I’d want to be doing is stopping 110kg flankers all afternoon.
4 Dec 2012, 10:09 am
@DumbSupporter-733:
Of course NZ can have a bad day, or the opposition can play a better game on the day. RWC’s have proven that.
NZ hasn’t won as often as AB supporters hoped, but more importantly, NZ was knocked out because we lost games we were not expected to lose.
So there is no reason any of the top teams should go into a match thinking they have no chance.
4 Dec 2012, 10:12 am
@Brads-723:
Thanks brads, but i have said all along that the Poms deserved there win.
They played a game that we have not played against in a long time.
Put us on the back foot and we could not recover. They saw this and just kept going.
4 Dec 2012, 10:18 am
@Atreides-735:
Irrespective of what any individual AB was feeling health wise, England pounced on every advantage they came across and ran out comfortable winners.
Even if the bug had of been a factor, we can’t dismiss the reality England were 15 zip ahead early in the match.
A period in the game I would expect the AB’s to be best equipped to stave off the after effects of any stomach bug issues.
4 Dec 2012, 10:19 am
@Hurricane-737:
Yep.
Quite refreshing really.
4 Dec 2012, 10:23 am
@Brads-738: Yea they did look pretty hungry. I didn’t see most of the match, but a friend said that the ref was watching the AB’s very closely at ruck time, and didn’t give them the leeway they usually enjoy?
Robshaw is a guy to watch too
4 Dec 2012, 10:33 am
@Atreides-740:
I disagree.
The AB’s weren’t under any extra scrutiny in my opinion.
Carter missed a couple of easy kicks early, while Farrell nailed everything on offer and racked up the 15 nil lead for the Poms.
Other teams have had the same opportunity this year and come up short.
4 Dec 2012, 10:42 am
@Brads-741: Ok…I’ll try catch the game on PVR sometime
5 Dec 2012, 13:08 pm
Aw man the AB’s got ***** slapped so hard that their man boobs concaved!!!!
5 Dec 2012, 18:50 pm
@Brads-723: You are a good guy
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