England vs New Zealand: Was this the greatest Rugby World Cup performance ever?

A dominant, destructive and convincing performance, combined with knocking out one of the great rugby teams of all time, ranks this English display as among the best ever witnessed at a World Cup

Seventy-four minutes are on the clock, Jonathan Joseph runs on for his brief cameo in England’s defining game of a generation and Manu Tuilagi says a prayer. The centre looks up to the sky, crosses his chest and whispers a personal message to God as he leaves the field, not looking once at the wreckage that he has left behind.

New Zealand must be sick at the sight of Tuilagi. Twice now he has been the executor of their downfall, but never before quite like this.

The story could’ve been very different for Tuilagi. During the dark days of his four-year injury nightmare, he genuinely doubted that he’d ever play for England again.

“It’s beyond my dreams this,” he said after the scarcely believable 19-7 victory over the All Blacks. “It’s an unbelievable feeling. it was amazing to get through to the semis. Standing here now and we’re in the final, I thank god. Thank god.”

God-like would be an ample word to use to describe Tuilagi’s performance, with the 28-year-old setting the tone with his try 96 seconds into the World Cup semi-final that put England into a lead they would not relinquish. He proved unstoppable at times, defended like his life depended on it, and when he barrelled his way over Sonny Bill Williams like a bowling ball slamming into the skittles, you knew he was having one of his days.

But you also knew very early on that England were building something special. They do not normally challenge the Haka predominantly due to the fact that you want to provoke the All Blacks as little as possible. But there was no fear from the English, no willingness to sit back and let New Zealand assert themselves.

The sight of Owen Farrell smirking during the Haka, winking at Aaron Smith as he went, showed everything you needed to see about the supreme confidence within this side. Not for a second did they believe they were going to lose this match.

Which brings us to the question of this piece: just how good a performance was this? It is incredibly hard to argue against it being the greatest ever, given the level of performance, the domination of the contact area and the supremacy that they held over rugby’s most consistent team.

This is not the New Zealand team of 2015, that’s for sure, having lost Richie McCaw, Dan Carter, Ma’a Nonu, Conrad Smith, Keven Mealamu and the rest of the gang. That goes against England’s argument – though they have made no case for themselves whatsoever in the fallout from the match. “All that stuff you're talking about is for you guys, so enjoy it because you won't be getting anything from us,” said Eddie Jones after the victory, knowing that his job this week is to keep such talk out of the heads of his players in order to keep them firmly grounded.

But where does it rank? New Zealand’s 1995 semi-final victory over England is one that stands out, though more so because of what Jonah Lomu achieved that day in scoring four tries to decimate the English, and the All Blacks’s rout of France in the quarter-finals in 2015 takes some matching in terms of sheer brilliance with the ball in hand.

Australia’s 1990s team achieved greatness, no doubt, with the semi-final win over New Zealand a remarkable feat of dominance over a side oozing with class and quality.

Yet it is hard to think of a performance quite like this one, when a side ranked as underdogs delivered such a one-sided display that left a once great team shell-shocked and in a state of disbelief. Kieran Read, the All Blacks captain, could barely express himself in the post-match press conference. “Gutted”, “desperate” - the same words kept popping up, with the No 8 unable to comprehend how his side had been played off the park.

England delivered one of the all-time great Rugby World Cup performances to beat New Zealand (AFP via Getty)

But the sheer greatness of this performance comes in naming the players in white who played such a key role in the performance. Sinckler, Itoje, Curry, Underhill, Ford, Farrell, Tuilagi, Watson. Each man a standout performer who on another day could easily have been named man of the match. And that isn’t the half of it – not a single England player underperformed on Saturday evening, and that includes the replacements, Dan Cole, Mark Wilson and Willi Heinz all playing key roles when they came on.

By demolishing the reigning champions and doing so by winning every single collision, every area and every fought-for yard, England produced what will remain as one of, if not the greatest performance ever seen at a Rugby World Cup. They will have to back it up next weekend if they want to be remembered as a genuinely great team, but it almost goes beyond belief how they could do any more than what they subject the All Blacks to.