KEY POINTS:
It's amazing how reigning champions England can go from World Cup winners to playing so badly four years later.
Surely they can't get any worse and two wins over Samoa and Tonga are needed to get through to the quarter-final stage, and we have to presume that will
happen but you never know.
You don't expect Samoa or Tonga to be in contention in these sorts of games but England, who are so the so-called champions, look nothing like a team of that calibre.
If England hadn't played so badly earlier in the tournament then you might pick one of those Polynesian teams to knock them over, but with the wake-up calls they've received in being run over by South Africa and struggling past USA you'd have to think they'd be up for this game.
It's Samoa and Tonga's fitness in the last 15-20 minutes where they lose touch and that could be the case here.
However, it may all be academic as on this form I can't see them going past the quarters and someone like Australia, who England could come across, would be huge favourites. After a huge physical battle against the Polynesian teams who love to get in amongst the rough stuff it would be hard to get up for another big match.
Another team struggling is England's close neighbours Ireland and to me there's no indication they have another gear before the game against France. A loss there would mean they'd have to beat Argentina and hope for the best.
To me they've been trying their hardest and still coming up with bad results. When you've got a squad of 30 and everyone is vying for positions, the players need to be at their best or people are going to be saying 'why isn't so-and-so getting a go'.
How you could go out and play half pie, as some people have suggested, is beyond me.
It shouldn't be forgotten that France needs to win this game as well after losing to Argentina and the pressure will still be there in front of the home crowd.
It'll be interesting to see how Scotland fronts up and what sort of side it puts out against the All Blacks.
The major talking points about the All Blacks team is putting Chris Masoe at blindside flanker, Reuben Thorne at lock and also it seems like a final decision could've been made around the indecisions about a centre pairing.
It looks like the combination they're looking at is Luke McAlister at second five and Conrad Smith at centre and that'll surprise a lot of people - especially down my way with Canterbury's Aaron Mauger being overlooked.
Perhaps Mauger's kicking game might be a bit more useful than McAlister's but obviously the selectors have looked at the idea of this combination from the start.
Of course it's a bit of a worry with McAlister at second five and as someone said to me it looks like playing outside Carlos Spencer early in his career has rubbed off on him with the dinky kicks and the 50/50 option taking. If it comes off, it comes off but if it doesn't there could cause some real headaches.
Mauger could play the next match against Romania but that's not going to be much help to the selectors nor himself. They're still changing players around but when it comes to the quarter-finals that's when we'll see the top side and hopefully the combinations will fit into place.
