All Blacks hardmen find Argentina a pain in the neck

Hansen has made just one change to the team that thumped Australia in Auckland last month, with Jerome Kaino replacing Victor Vito at blindside flanker.

Since its inception in 1987, the tournament has been a showcase for concentrated excellence in the sport. The holders could well face their bogey-team France in the quarter finals and are 6-1 to exit the competition at that stage. Dawson, a retired English rugby union player, led the way, backed by team-mates from the Battersea Ironsides rugby club. On paper players like Wesley Fofana and Mathieu Basteraud could take them deep into the tournament, but it’s probably not worth losing sleep over.

Days before the opening match of the Rugby World Cup, Heineken surprised a Dublin pub chock-full of rugby fans with the coolest prize machine ever.

Hourcade said wins over Australia and South Africa in the Rugby Championship in recent years showed they were on the right track.

“If you give them a sniff that they have a chance, it could be a long day at the office for the England team”. Do you believe that the mighty All Blacks can become the first side to defend the trophy?

Having agreed to join Racing Metro and at the age of 33, the World Cup is likely to represent the last New Zealand sees of Carter in his pomp. In 2007 they did so again in the quarter-final in Cardiff.

Of course, results between those two countries are by no means one-sided. To be fair, it’s a pretty good service: you can personalise the app by selecting your favourite team and following their preparations for every game through news articles and video updates, as well as possessing the capability to add their matches to your phone’s calendar, and checking ticket availability.

“To be honest we have a game to play this week, we got bigger things to be anxious about”, said Mealamu. Jonah Lomu, the All Blacks’ wing, had already shaken up the tournament with his phenomenal strength and speed but here, against England, he took brute force to another level.

Carter had to watch from the sidelines as understudies Aaron Cruden, Colin Slade and Stephen Donald combined to fill the fly-half role he vacated, guiding the All Blacks to the World Cup for the first time in 24 years on home soil four years ago.

The statistics alone are formidable: The All Blacks have won an astonishing 76% of all the “tests” (as internationals are called) they’ve played since their first in 1903.

Today’s match will be anything but usual for Pacific Nations champions Fiji, a team with plenty of talented players but at the opposite end of the scale to England, whom they have never beaten, in terms of finance and infrastructure.