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PARIS - This weekend's World Cup semi-finals will not only see the title dreams of two countries shattered.
Defeat will also bring down the international curtain on some of the game's most durable stars.
They will experience the same misery suffered by Wallaby greats George Gregan and Stephen Larkham when their team were knocked out by England in the quarter-finals.
At least they had already tasted World Cup success in 1999.
Compatriots Stirling Mortlock, Phil Waugh and George Smith are unlikely now ever to do so, twice denied by England in 2003 and 2007.
The same could be said for France, the Wallabies' victims in the 1999 final.
Surviving members of that team, Raphael Ibanez, Fabien Pelous, Pieter de Villiers and Christophe Dominici, could well face the final cut against England this Saturday in the semi-finals.
For Ibanez, Pelous and Dominici, it will be the second successive time that the English will have denied them at the last-four stage.
For Pelous, last Sunday's quarter-final victory over the All Blacks, was particularly sweet as it gave him possibly two more matches in the blue jersey.
"I thought that could have been my final match (against the Kiwis)," said the 33-year-old, who won the first of his 117 caps back in 1995.
"It was a huge relief that it wasn't because I didn't want to bow out on a losing note or end my relationship with the French team. It will be a huge gap in my heart when that happens."
Dominici also doesn't want to leave the stage without having the Webb Ellis trophy in his hands.
"I have had a lot of ups and a lot of downs," said the 35-year-old.
"One was when I deliberately tripped Jason Robinson in the 2003 semi-final and was sin-binned. That lost us valuable momentum.
"When I trudged off at the final whistle I looked at those players who knew that their last chance had gone and I said: 'My God, I never want to feel like that'. I was determined to keep on going to have another chance."
England veterans Lawrence Dallaglio, Mike Catt, Robinson and Mark Regan have already lifted the trophy.
"Of course it's sad for players who give their all to the international cause to leave the sport without that cachet but in the end there is, and can only be, one winner," said 36-year-old Catt.
- AFP
