Rugby World Cup final marks the end of an era

Australia versus New Zealand. The Wallabies against the All Blacks. A golden dawn struggling to break through the darkness.

The Wallabies are a team rediscovering their pride and identity after a decade of false dawns, discipline problems, and all too frequent capitulations. This is a young team in terms of group development. The coach has only been there for a year and there is a sense that perhaps the Rugby World Cup is simply too much, too soon for these players. Perhaps more importantly, given that the Wallabies are trying to build a legacy that will live in the jersey long after the current occupants move on, it could be argued that defeat would be more beneficial to the substance of that team culture than victory.

The All Blacks, on the other hand, are a team that knows exactly who they are. They are a part of a legacy of excellence that has rarely been seen in any sport. There is a touch of destiny about this team who boast 48 wins and two draws from 53 starts under their current coach since the last World Cup. They have also eclipsed the Wallabies’ record of most consecutive World Cup match wins on their quest to be the first country to win the Webb Ellis Cup three times and the first to defend it by winning back-to-back tournaments.

Regardless of the controversies that have happened during this tournament, this is the right final for the 2015 Rugby World Cup. Of the five matches the All Blacks have failed to win since the last World Cup, three of those have been against the Wallabies. The men in gold have twice forced draws and once a defeat on the seemingly invincible men in black. The final is also a defacto third Bledisloe Cup match (although only the little gold cup is actually up for grabs, the big silver one remains in the land of the long white cloud… for now). Each team won the match they hosted in 2015 but were comprehensively defeated away from home. It is fitting that a decider will be on neutral turf.

Although the Wallabies have never lost a Rugby World Cup match on UK soil, and are the team that has most consistently troubled New Zealand in the modern era (i.e. since South Africa were re-admitted to the international rugby scene in 1992) they have enjoyed precious little success in the past dozen years. That is no coincidence.

In 2001, the All Blacks first selected an openside flanker by the name of Richard Hugh McCaw, and in 2003 he was first joined by a flyhalf named Daniel William Carter. Since 2004 they have been the twin pillars of the All Blacks playing group. Encountering both men on the rugby field at once has proven to be a daunting experience for opponents for more than a decade. Giants of the game, prodigiously talented, fiercely competitive, yet above all humble gentlemen, the narrative of this World Cup final is all about these two men in particular.

In what will be his 148th international cap, Richie McCaw will lead the All Blacks into battle for the 110th time, and should they successfully retain the Webb Ellis Cup it will mark his 97th victory as captain.

Statistics don’t do this man justice. This is the best player to ever grace the sport. The story of him playing with a broken foot through the knockout stages of the 2011 Rugby World Cup is the stuff of which legends are made.

Every opponent who has faced him would rate McCaw as one of the toughest competitors they have come across, not just because of how hard he plays, but because of how smart he is. McCaw is a true student of the game, he understands rugby. He has continually evolved his own skills to remain not just relevant in the modern game, but to set the standard by which others are measured and to which they aspire.

There isn’t a player on the planet that understands the intricacies of the breakdown as well as McCaw. He’s a master of knowing when to pounce for a turnover, of knowing exactly how long he can rely on the forbearance of the referee when slowing the ball down, of making the audacious seem perfectly reasonable.

While opposition supporters may be able to convince themselves that McCaw’s play is on the wrong side of the offside line more often than not, no rugby fan can do anything but appreciate the sublime skills of the other man whose history making All Black career draws to a close at Twickenham this weekend.

International rugby’s leading points scorer with 1579, Dan Carter will play his 112th and final Test for the All Blacks in a Rugby World Cup final. The man who stamped his authority on the game in the 2005 Lions series with a performance that is as close to perfect as any flyhalf has ever given, Carter remains just as complete a player more than a decade later. Throughout his career he has continued to be fearless in contact, assured with the boot, and has shown time and again a calm unflappable poise that allows him to control a game of rugby in a manner that few can match. Carter always has shown an uncanny understanding of time and space and an almost preternatural ability to create both for the players around him.

In the squad but not taking part in the knockout games in 2003, injured during that quarter-final against France in 2007, injured at training and forced out of the tournament in the pool stages in 2011, the 2015 final represents Carter’s last chance to lift the Webb Ellis Cup.

Come the final whistle at Twickenham on Sunday morning how will their stories end? Will the rugby world see the man who is inarguably the greatest player to ever lace up a boot become the first captain to win back-to-back World Cups? Will the game’s finest flyhalf turn in one last virtuoso performance on rugby’s grandest stage?

It would be a fitting finale to the careers of two of the game’s most celebrated players; one that every true rugby fan could rejoice at. Unfortunately neither life nor sport offers up a fairy tale very often.

Regardless of the outcome, with the international retirements of Dan Carter and Richie McCaw, the darkness will never again look quite as ominous.