Awesome All Blacks thrash Tonga

Yet here was hard evidence that, whatever team Mitchell selects are going to take all the beating. They can even kick goals now; after Daniel Carter's recent excellent marksmanship, Leon MacDonald tonight converted 12 out of 12 and also went over for a try and a total of 29 points.

Spencer, who got a try, converted the other as scores from Daniel Braid, Carter, Corey Flynn, Kees Meeuws and a penalty try made up the rout. Some teams see the haka and want to curl up and die. Not the Tongans. After watching with some disdain, they launched into their own fearsome war dance, the Sipi Tau, a challenge which saw them advance threateningly up to and past the halfway line into their opposition's den.

It's something to behold as they scream about death and victory, destroying souls, crunching hearts and eating fire.

This time, though, it was soon evident who was going to do the crunching and destroying once flanker Braid buried over from a rolling maul in the seventh minute.

Before long, it looked like an exercise in set-piece practice for the favourites. Tonga's only points came from a Pierre Hola try, converted by Sateki Tuipulotu.

The All Blacks survived a few trademark Tongan big hits, mainly in the cause of desperate defence, and referee Pablo Deluca had to tell their exhausted captain, the heroically named Benhur Kivalu, to calm down and keep his discipline after one overeager high tackle on MacDonald.

Easier said than done when the Blacks' sheer inventive relentlessness kept rolling over and through the men in red. Some of their back-line movements were sublime and even their 16-and-a-half stone young hooker, Flynn, popped up on the wing to plough straight through and over full-back Sila Va'enuku.

Follow that, England.