Well, well, well. The All Black team that most kiwi rugby fanatics would call the best world cup chance that New Zealand has had since 1987 has crashed out in our worst ever performance at the RWC.
What a classic game of rugby though. The French deserved to be within a few points of the All Blacks. In the end, that was all they needed as the luck went their way with some unbelievable match official decisions that enabled France to launch an all out attack on the men in black.
Unlike other All Black World cup disappointments of the past, I really think that the boys were simply 'shit outa luck' this time. I don't have that gut wrenching sense of loss. That feeling of self pity. To me, the All Blacks didn't play quite well enough to overcome some bad luck. It doesn't feel quite as bad as when we lose through being beaten fair and square.
It is becoming blatantly obvious that when we play important games with a Northern Hemisphere referee officiating, we need at least a two try buffer (14 point lead). We need to allow for the fact that the ref may well be the best player on the other team.
I'm not much of a soccer fan, but even I know about the 'hand of god' incident. In a lot of ways we saw a similar incident this morning with THAT forward pass that made a winning try for the French. In the same way that Maradona broke the golden rule of soccer (no use of the hands) to help his side win, the French were able to beat the All Blacks by breaking the golden rule of rugby- You cannot pass the ball to a player that is running in front of you.
It will be interesting to see how much attention the ref's performance will be given by the passionate (and angry) New Zealand Rugby public
That pass was forward, period.
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