By Andrew Mehrtens for the UK Times
If England play like they did against the All Blacks in the final on Saturday then I would say the World Cup is theirs. It is hard to see anybody beating them but the only team I could see staying with them are South Africa. New Zealand could at their best, but the Springboks' size and physique means that they can handle that side of the game. They will have to be immense, though, because that was the best England performance I have seen. Richie McCaw said he thought it was the best performance he had seen from any team for a long time and he has been involved in a few himself — that is high praise.
They took the initiative even before the start. I had a debate with Matt Dawson in the Radio 5 live commentary booth about the England response to the haka. He said he did not like it because it was focusing on the wrong thing but my view is that England took control of the situation. They responded in a way that they knew they were going to but the All Blacks didn't. Even the time it took to take off their tracksuits will have given them a feeling of control and initiative and that was borne out by the five furious minutes that followed.
![England players look on while New Zealand players perform the haka. Photo /Getty](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/resizer/v2/IS5YRFX5XK56NDU4QBUDEB32OE.jpg?auth=ebc62af942c19030b73c4a97a604d4af83d4240b442606ca93e8c1be95d96b79&width=16&height=11&quality=70&smart=true)
The directness was also a difference. The All Blacks forward runners usually have two or three guys around them who can receive the ball and there is often a little interplay. That is good but it means sometimes they can have less momentum. The All Blacks got the ball, started accelerating and then looked for an option to pass. That is not just flying headlong into contact, which is what we saw from Billy Vunipola. Ben Youngs's perfect timing meant he got the ball at pace and they got front-foot ball and it flowed from there. Vunipola and others were hitting with an incredibly energy.