All Blacks move into the final but this was a sorry mismatch

NEW Zealand have booked their place in a fifth World Cup final, but after the pyrotechnics of last weekend’s quarter-finals this first semi-final of the 2023 tournament fizzled out.

- NICK CAIN

This was simply because the gap in class between the All Blacks and Argentina in Paris on Friday night was too great for this match to ever ignite.

Any player who scores a hat-trick of tries like Kiwi try-machine Will Jordan did in Paris on Friday night deserves rich plaudits, but at the same time this seven-try drubbing leaves World Rugby’s administrators with the awkward question of whether they want their semi-final showpieces to be pale shadows of their quarter-finals?

One uncomfortable consequence of the ludicrously early draw for this tournament was the Mexican wave that kept rippling around the ground ten minutes into the second-half. Argentina were still battling to keep New Zealand at bay, but it signalled the crowd no longer valued the match as a competitive semi-final.

By that stage the All Blacks were in complete control, having built on a 20-6 half-time lead when Aaron Smith scored their fourth try two minutes into the second-half.

It was a peach, with the world class scrum-half making the most of New Zealand’s dominant scrum to break on the openside, using his footwork to step past his opposite number, Gonzalo Bertranou. Smith then accelerated clear and bewitched a second Argentine defender with a dummy before diving over – and with Richie Mo’unga converting the All Blacks stretched out to 27-6.

New Zealand were not faultless, but when they occasionally stuttered – such as when Beauden Barrett was dumped backwards by the Pumas defence during their next assault – Smith was instantly on hand to restore momentum with a linebreak. A couple of phases later it resulted in Shannon Frizell muscling over for his second try.