KEY POINTS:
The joy of watching another hapless England side bumble their way to ridicule should only be short-lived.
World rugby needs a strong England and, for England to be strong, they have to become serious about lifting their skill level.
Rugby is on the cusp of great change. The
momentum to introduce new rules that reward creativity and ability is now thought to be unstoppable.
England, if they continue to flounder in their development of basic skills, will fall off the map. They will become rugby's greatest shame - the country with the most resources and smallest ability to harness it.
For the past four years, they've survived on their ability to beat sides up. They do nothing clever or intricate, just let loose the dogs of war and hope that is enough.
To see them regress to this has been sad. Between 2000 and 2003, they were a good side.
They had a huge pack which was more capable than many assumed and they played with width and pace.
In the 2001 Six Nations, they scored 28 tries, a number that has steadily declined every year since to just eight in 2008.
The demise of test rugby in the June and November windows has been blamed on the selection of weakened teams.
There will be no discernible lift in public interest, however, if the likes of England start picking their best side but remain outclassed.
How much more compelling would the last two weeks have been if England had some potency in their backline?
If they could have generated the width of the All Blacks, matched the pace and skill level and still offered that brutal forward power, then they really would have been tests.
What we got was a continuation of this curious cycle where the All Blacks dominate with a high-tempo, fluid game that requires muscular, mobile forwards to pass out of contact and capitalise on turnover possession.
Then, come the World Cup, an entirely different style of football - one where teams squeeze the life out of opponents, play for field position and hope to secure penalties or land drop goals - ends up being successful.
Because of this split, there are anomalies in the records enjoyed by international teams. England won the World Cup in 2003, made the final in 2007 and lost 50 per cent of their tests in between, while the All Blacks have amassed an incredible win ratio of 88 per cent under Graham Henry but were dumped out of the quarter-finals last year.
Despite all the recent navel gazing and obsessing about the World Cup, New Zealanders wouldn't change records with England for any money.
The real danger for England now is that if they don't evolve, start trying to build forwards who can play with the ball and backs who can create and exploit space, they are going to see that win ratio drop further, with the World Cup no longer offering redemption.
Rugby is heading towards a place where the style played by the All Blacks will no longer be the antithesis of the style of rugby that dominated the knockout stages of the World Cup.
Last year, the semifinalists - South Africa, England, France and Argentina - were all defensively strong. They applied pressure through aggressive defence, were all combative at the breakdown and accurate at set-piece.
They all played for field position and then looked to force penalties or bludgeon their way over for tries. It was an effective way to play at the World Cup.
Where an average test involving tier one nations features around 55 kicks, the final of last year's tournament saw 91 kicks and the semi-finals 86 and 85. The knock-out stages also saw 29 attempted drop goals.
But the chance of that style of football being effective at the next tournament will be greatly reduced if a decision to keep backlines five metres back at scrums is ratified.
If teams can't pass the ball back into their 22 and clear on the full, counter-attacking sides will have greater opportunities.
If sanctions are introduced to increase free kick infringements, the pressure game will be obsolete, with the advantage thrown over to sides who can play at pace and pass out of the tackle.
That is the All Blacks who, for the past four years and probably longer, have been playing a vastly different game to everyone else.
Analysis by the International Rugby Board of the 2006 Tri Nations shows the biggest difference between the All Blacks and their opponents was the number of passes made by forwards.
In the 2006 competition, New Zealand's props made 31 passes which compared with 10 made by Australian props and five by the South Africans.
In one match, New Zealand's forwards made twice as many passes as their backs and in five of the six matches, the forwards passed the ball more than the backs.
Similar statistics compiled for the 2008 Six Nations show that Wales, who won their second Grand Slam in three years, passed the ball the most and were also the team who passed the ball most through their forwards.
The All Blacks under Henry have moved the ball through all 15 players and relied on the high skill level of their forward pack to create unstoppable momentum.
That has delivered, by some distance, the best record of the past four years. No one else even gets close.
England definitely don't get close and if their power game is failing to win tests in between World Cups and becomes less effective at World Cups, what will be the point in persevering with it?
They have to join the revolution now. Watching them at Eden Park was painful. It was also boring and, as much as Englishmen don't want to see their side come out here and get stuffed, New Zealanders don't want to see the All Blacks go unchallenged.
There are numerous good things about the game north of the equator right now. It is enjoying a period of commercial growth of which administrators in the south can only dream.
Money is pouring in, crowds are building and no question - those guys know how to make a game into an occasion.
But for all they are doing right, they are still getting the most vital ingredient wrong - they are not producing enough individuals who can really play the game.
