England...31 New Zealand...28It is not often that England beat the All Blacks in a marvellous Test match and still feel a twinge of disappointment. The barometer of any team's mood is the reaction in that split second after the final whistle and Martin Johnson stood motionless, showing no hint of euphoria. English scoreboards occasionally tell white lies and the captain's visible relief said it all.
Even Clive Woodward, England's head coach, wore the look of a general whose troops had just launched an all-out assault yet gained only a few muddy yards of no-man's-land.
Put bluntly, a New Zealand team missing 21 top players came within an ace of beating a full-strength England at home, and would have done so had the home side's two big Bens not struck defiantly in the closing moments.
Ben Cohen's perfectly-timed corner-flagging tackle on the flying Ben Blair was a stunning effort and Ben Kay then stole the injury-time line-out ball which ultimately denied New Zealand's splendid last-quarter fightback.
The English management, though, will reflect on other, less comfortable issues, not least the depth of New Zealand's reserve artillery. There will be concern, too, at how they managed to lead 31-14 only to finish clinging on. It is five years since a visiting side crossed the English tryline four times and to blame it all on the extraordinary Jonah Lomu is to create another smokescreen.
For, leaving aside the forward battle where Lewis Moody and Richard Hill were superb and the English scrummage performed well, Woodward's backline had difficulties in both defence and attack. In particular, they had little answer to the All Blacks' clever, slick and well-executed use of decoy runners, best illustrated by replacement scrum-half Danny Lee's late try when the killer passes were artfully shielded from defenders' view by the outstanding flanker Marty Holah's lateral run.
England, in contrast, did not get the ball to their gifted new wing James Simpson-Daniel until the 44th minute and were unable to weave anything like the threatening midfield patterns of their opponents. "They have some very good decoy lines which are bordering on the illegal and which we didn't handle well," said England's defensive coach Phil Larder.
"There are areas of concern at the way we were opened up out wide and we're playing Australia next weekend who are very shrewd at analysing opposition weaknesses and are very potent in the same areas."
How would he advise his men to deal better with Lomu next time? "I'd probably work with the SAS and have somebody with an elephant gun in the stand."
To bang on endlessly about the turnovers which also hoisted New Zealand back into the game, though, is to forget England were liable to be a little rusty having not played a full-strength Test for seven months and, crucially, to overlook the intensity and quality of the spectacle.
This was England's 16th home win on the trot but there was nothing remotely mundane about the sight of Lomu, ball just about wedged in the crook of his left arm, crashing unstoppably over for the game's first try, nor the pace of Doug Howlett, the quickest winger in the world, sprinting clear after Tana Umaga had juggled and caught Richard Hill's attempted offload.
For New Zealand coach John Mitchell, otherwise tactically spot on, it all went wrong inside 10 minutes either side of the interval. First Moody dived into the zone of pain in the right corner to reward neat approach work by Simpson-Daniel and Wilkinson, before Wilkinson, who finished with 21 points, displayed vision and pace to spot the absent full-back and touch down his own chip.
After Andrew Mehrtens had been robbed to allow Cohen to surge irresistibly downfield for his 16th try in 18 Tests, the All Black skipper Taine Randell gathered his men beneath the posts to demand a calculated response. What he got was a breathtaking second rumble by Lomu, his eighth in seven games against England, and a gripping finale. They don't go a bundle on moral victories in Auckland but this may be an exception.
Cohen was modest about his flying tackle - "If I'd missed him I would have gone in, packed my bags, got in the car and driven home . . . I wouldn't have played for England again" - but Hill, winning his 50th cap, summed it up by admitting England "had to win for our personal satisfaction and our personal development."
ENGLAND: Robinson; Simpson-Daniel, Tindall, Greenwood, Cohen; Wilkinson, Dawson; Woodman, Thompson, Vickery, Johnson, Grewcock (Kay 61), Moody, Hill, Dallaglio. Replacements: Johnston for Greenwood (half-time); Kay for Grewcock (61 mins); Back for Dallaglio (70 mins); Healey for Simpson-Daniel (78 mins).
NEW ZEALAND: Blair; Howlett, Umaga, Lowen, Lomu; Spencer, Devine; McDonnell, Hore, Meeuws, Williams, K Robinson, Randell, Holah, Broomhall. Replacements: Lee for Devine (29 mins), Mehrtens for Spencer (half-time); M Robinson for Lowen (59 mins); Mika for K Robinson (62 mins).
Referee: J Kaplan (South Africa).
