The Minnows, including England

Wednesday saw the last of the teams enter the contest. Realistically none of the teams playing for the first time stand a chance of winning progressing out of the pool stages, Italy are the possible exceptions to that.

But, today the death of English Rugby was finally kicked home. 36-0! Although there wasn't a try bonus point, that's a bigger margin than England managed to beat the USA by, both points conceded, and points scored were for the losing side in this match than the earlier one.

England had one player on the pitch that looked like he had a clue. When he left with a hamstring injury, Jason Robinson quite rightly got a standing ovation, not least as a farewell to a great servant of both versions of the game. He might be back, but almost certainly not in time for Samoa, and if the men in blue get any sniff of the ball, they have the pace, invention and desire to beat the English, just because the English won't score points. They failed to sparkle against the USA, they failed to even threaten against the Boks.

England might not, technically, be out of it yet. If they lose to Samoa they will be, for sure. But, whichever side wins at the Millennium Stadium tomorrow, Wales (I hope) or Australia (my head says more likely, they tend to peak in World Cups) will take enough from the result to beat the English in the next round anyway.

Pack up guys in white, your days as World Champions are counting down, and less than 20.