2019 Rugby World Cup: Dylan Cleaver - This is the end of the All Blacks' dominance and the start of a new rivalry

Anthony Watson of England consoles Anton Lienert-Brown and Sam Cane. Photo / Getty Images

COMMENT:

It stings a little bit, like undiluted Dettol on an open sore.

The fact that it's an England side coached by an Australian makes it worse, no doubt.

Salty, even.

But it's the end of the World Cup, not the world.

Let's give magnanimity a go – we haven't tried it in this situation for a while (since 1995 probably, and even that was tempered by the enigma of Susie the Waitress).

England had a plan.

They came to stop the All Blacks playing.

They had all the answers, the All Blacks just a bunch of open-ended questions.

Perhaps we should have seen it coming.

Perhaps Perth wasn't the anomaly it was painted as.

Perhaps Eddie Jones is just a little bit smarter than our smartest.

That's two semifinals after all where his game plan has neutered the best attacking team on the planet. Sixteen years apart, mind. Still?

Please don't kick the cat.

Don't post beer-fueled rants on Facebook, or add tweets to an echo chamber of grievance.

Don't spit venom at a coach that might have failed this time but isn't a failure.

Don't aim your crosshairs at the captain who has given 126 tests and 11 years of service to a cause so brutal that he will likely spend the winter of his life managing pain.

Some players had better games than others.

You probably know who.

You're cleverer than the average punter.

All Blacks flanker Ardie Savea scores his try. Photo / Mark Mitchell

We all are, aren't we?

That's sport.

It soars, it sinks, it never flatlines.

It keeps blood pumping through the veins.

That's why in a digital age when we have all sorts of reasons not to engage with something as fundamentally human, we keep coming back to it.

For consecutive World Cups it gave us pride as a nation and reinforced the idea that our size and isolation will not be an ongoing impediment to success, even in an era where the real rugby money sits in vaults far north of the equator.

This one didn't go awfully, but it didn't go so well.

The All Blacks came up against an England side that is the real deal.

Some teams are beaten the moment they line up in the tunnel and see 23 blokes next to them dressed in black.

England used to be that sort of team.

Not so much now.

You could tell by the way they met the haka.

By the way they spent the first minutes of this game busting tackles, stripping the All Blacks of possession and generally imposing themselves at boss level.

You sense this is rugby's next great rivalry.

It's about time that England came to the party with all their resources and bluster.

Not that it will give New Zealanders much solace right now.

Instead take small comfort in the fact that all good things must come to an end and this has been a very, very good thing.

The All Blacks won 18 World Cup matches in a row (and no, nobody's counting the Italy cancellation as a draw).

It will take England, or Wales, or South Africa, a long time to surpass that feat.

It will take other rivals, here's looking at you Australia, even longer.

There were times when it seemed inarguable that the All Blacks were the best team at this tournament, but last night wasn't one of them.

It still stings a little to write that.

Imagine what it must feel to live it.