England impress but All Blacks are still team to beat

WHAT a pulsating weekend of rugby. As we are now able to draw breath, the end result sees England, New Zealand, Wales and South Africa making it into the semi- finals... just as I predicted. But what drama we witnessed to get us to this point. England and New Zealand lay down a marker with two outstanding performances, Wales were gifted the win by France and South Africa were pushed all the way by a hugely impressive Japan. The games had everything; brilliant rugby, controversial decisions that led to many yellow cards and one red card which was completely warranted. England kicked things off with a demolition of Australia. It was seriously impressive because the Aussies threw everything at them but England soaked it all up and pulled away in the second half. I was concerned that England might be slightly underprepared due to the cancellation of their game last week but they were bang on the money. They were powerful, they were aggressive and they attacked with a real potency, which made me wonder if they are the team to beat in this World Cup. Then New Zealand played Ireland and took things to an even higher level. It was like they saw what England had done and said: ‘That’s good, but we are better’. What impressed me so much is what impresses me every time I watch the All Blacks — they do the simple things so well. It is easy to focus on the razor sharp attack and the tries scored, but it is their contact skills and passing that allow the attacking game to happen. They are so efficient in what they do, not over committing players to the ruck which allows more players to be options in attack. England v New Zealand next week is going to be a titanic battle. Wales were nowhere near as impressive but it doesn’t matter, they are in the semi-final. France were, well, they were typically French and quite literally, gave Wales this victory. Sebastian Vahaamahina had one of many brain explosions in the French team when he elbowed Aaron Wainwright and, quite rightly, received a red card. But there were so many other moments which were crazy and it was like France did not want to win this game. Complete madness at times. In the final match, South Africa ended the fairytale for the host nation Japan, producing a very powerful and professional performance to win quite comfortably in the end. But Japan really scared them in the first half, and had them on the rack for long periods, yet they just could not find a way to breakdown the Springbok defence. The hosts, yet again, proved that they have a right to eat at the top table of world rugby and a place must be found for them in the Rugby Championship to build on what has happened over the past few weeks.