Carlsberg don’t do Rugby World Cup finals (Heineken, as you couldn’t fail to notice amid the endless sponsor’s messages, do) but in the absence of an England side whose exit now seems like a distant bad dream, this is the one that tournament organisers would have ordered.
All they needed was a match to go with it. Long before the incomparable Dan Carter had snapped a Hollywood drop goal over the posts deep into the second half to wrest the initiative from a resurgent Australia in probably his last international appearance, they knew they had it.
Before the match, the sun beamed down on a brass band playing The Final Countdown as green and gold bystanders bopped along with those in black. In the calm before the storm, the air was still and warm on a perfect autumn afternoon that was again conducive to the sort of rugby that captivates and captures floating voters.
Before the pyrotechnics and Red Arrows did their thing, there were clips shown from Rugby World Cup finals past that seemed as if beamed in from another age – all heavy cotton jerseys and players unrecognisable from the supreme athletes of today.
It was yet another reminder, if any were needed, of the achievements of that cadre of players sporting the silver fern for perhaps the last time. And, in particular, the captain, Richie McCaw – representing his country for the 148th and probably final time.
He has played for New Zealand since 2001, traversing and transcending those various eras. When he was interviewed at the end after seeing his team over the line one more time, everyone in the ground – those dejected hordes in yellow and gold included – applauded.
The tournament has changed out of all recognition in that time too and is now a money-making machine that will return £80m to World Rugby and a £15m surplus to the Rugby Football Union. From those waking up on the other side of the world to tune in, to those packing fanzones in Richmond, Exeter, Rugby and Trafalgar Square and the 80,000-plus inside the stadium, this was indisputably the centre of the sporting world.
Such was its gravitational pull that there were the usual anecdotal tales of those spending thousands on travel and tickets from the southern hemisphere to make sure they could be there.
The sun shone on this corner of south-west London as it has on this tournament, except where England are concerned. The night a dismal England exited to Australia amid a downpour seemed aeons ago.
Jonny Wilkinson’s presence on the final ticket, which came in at up to £715, was the closest the hosts came to a presence.
And when Swing Low, Sweet Chariot rang around the stands amid wave after wave of early New Zealand attacks, it seemed entirely incongruous. If England’s early exit robbed the tournament of some of its power to “galvanise a nation”, it has delivered on every other level imaginable.
It was fitting in some ways that Lord Coe, indelibly linked with the triumph of London 2012, was among those watching from the Royal Box.
This Rugby World Cup has tapped into much that was good about those Olympic Games. Despite the eye-watering cost of those tickets it has somehow managed to also feel warm and inclusive. Not to mention a joyous, stirring celebration of some of the best sport on the planet. A total of 2,477,805 tickets were sold, with stands 97% full.
Concerns about the cost of tickets and quibbles about our inadequate rail network aside, it has been an organisational, sporting and commercial triumph. The British public have once again proved that we are at least world class at hosting major sporting events, if not winning them. If Japan set the tone, then Australia and the All Blacks took the ball and ran with it.
Like those Olympics, it may yet be that the legacy promises made on the back of delivering a hugely successful tournament weigh heavy on those who have vowed to deliver a step change for the sport. All of that can wait, as can the depressing crawl through the wreckage of England’s campaign.
By the time Prince Harry was handing the Webb Ellis Cup back to McCaw, on the same spot he had taken centre stage in the opening ceremony six long weeks earlier‚ it was impossible not to simply forget all of that and marvel at the feat of this incomparable band of black-clad sporting brothers.
