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There was a grave message for the rugby world as the final whistle blew on the All Blacks trouncing of Australia in Sydney on Saturday. Few, if any, have acknowledged it.

As the world champions were rightly lauded for the stratospheric standard of some of their play in a 42-8 victory, it became clear that the very future of international rugby is on a precipice.

If this sort of one-sided romp between traditionally fierce and hitherto well-matched rivals becomes a regular occurrence in the Rugby Championship, how long before even New Zealand lose interest?

Events at the ANZ Stadium on Saturday highlighted so much more than a fleeting gulf between two southern hemisphere giants.

We learned that England’s series whitewash of the Wallabies earlier this summer may not have been the stuff of legend some commentators suggested it was at the time.

We learned that Wales possibly deserved more credit than they were given for their efforts against Steve Hansen’s men, notwithstanding their third Test capitulation.

And we learned that authorities need to act as a matter of urgency to protect the cash-cow of the Test game by addressing the one thing that is threatening to kill its competitiveness – the French Top 14.

Those who believe results like Saturday’s are a mere aberration, should look at the issues one by one. They are as follows:

The French basket-case

The No.1 danger to the international scene...and the game there is the rugby basket-case to end them all.

Frankly, unless the French Federation takes steps to preserve the primacy of the national side then the rest of the world is at risk of contagion.

So established, so deeply rooted in the consciousness of their rugby supporters is the club scene, that many would readily put local interests before the Tricolore.

The bigger problem though is the vast sums of money French clubs have at their disposal through television income and rich benefactors like Mourad Boudjellal at Toulon.

Most of them – and Toulon and South African-dominated Montpellier are good examples – are able to flood their squads with the best talent from anywhere in the world.

The effect is two-fold; it diminishes the playing resource at the disposal of France coach Guy Noves, and it tempts southern hemisphere stars to ditch their Test careers in order to earn life-changing sums of money on the other side of the world, a drip-drip process that is gradually weakening and reducing the appeal of Test rugby.

(Image: GEOFF CADDICK/AFP/Getty Images)

You wouldn’t mind if the Top 14 was a thrilling spectacle envied the world over.

It’s a good league for sure, but so many matches are dull, forward-dominated affairs.

The other political flashpoint is in the refusal of the French clubs to keep June exclusively for the Test game.

Last season’s Top 14 final between Toulon and Racing Metro took place on June 24. Completely ridiculous, especially when you consider that it all started back up again on Saturday, meaning that the summer break lasted all of eight weeks.

This is the worst example of the tail wagging the dog. Again, the Federation must stand up to the clubs and order them to get their tanks off all lawns during June, which has long been an international window.

It said it all that when the French were turned over by Argentina in Tucuman in June, 10 of their 23-man squad were debutants. Bizarrely, they won the second Test 27-0. Quite how is anyone's guess.

And the problem spreads when French clubs curtail the involvement of players from other nations and things like threaten to block Leigh Halfpenny’s availability for a Lions tour.

It’s damaging, and is a matter that must be confronted.

(Image: leighhalfpenny/Instagram)

All Black dominance intensifying

New Zealand have done a better job than any other nation in the world of keeping hold of, and getting the best years out of, their very top players.

Someone like full-back Charles Piutau, who went to Wasps last season and is now at Ulster, is an exception, but on the whole Kiwis tend to come north for the euro or the pound either when their Test days are over or when they realise they’re never going to begin.

The NZRFU have done this largely by making the All Black jersey sacred, by preserving its mystique and adopting the mantra followed by Spurs great Danny Blanchflower, that the game is about glory.

Richie McCaw could have been a far wealthier man when he hung up his boots last year, but he wouldn’t have two World Cup winners medals in his locker had he taken up some of the eye-watering club offers that came his way.

And yet here is where the sheer dominance of New Zealand could turn in on itself.

If sides like Australia and others cannot compete, their scalps become worthless and the appeal of that jersey declines. That’s when players are vulnerable to the French financial lure.

It’s hard to think of a time in the modern era when New Zealand have been so comfortably ahead, not just of Six Nations sides but the Springboks and Wallabies as well. Nobody benefits from that. Not even the All Blacks.

Wallaby woe

If New Zealand have done well to keep the best of their talent, the same cannot be said about the Aussies...and the situation is about to get worse.

There just isn’t the money in the Australian game to finance multiple fat contracts to stave off European suitors. The cash earned from the Lions tour in 2013 helped pay off some of the ARU debt, but there were cuts in the organisation soon after and the Lions aren’t in town again for nine years.

Only last November they were in the World Cup final, but against the All Blacks at the weekend Australia looked bereft, and worse than that, lacking in motivation.

This comes on the back of an unbelievably poor Super Rugby competition for their provincial sides during which only the Brumbies emerged with any degree of credit.

For years Australia have somehow produced brilliant sides even though union is the fifth most popular sport in their country and the playing base is relatively small.

How much longer can they get away with it though?

If it reaches a point where the Australian public feels their team cannot beat the All Blacks – and that’s how they surely felt on Saturday night – then it will have a serious knock-on effect for the Rugby Championship.

The Springbok decline

South Africa could so easily have lost a series on home soil to Ireland in June when they were turned over in the first Test and trailed by 14 points in the second.

Somehow they pulled it out of the bag, but against Argentina in Nelspruit on Saturday they needed two tries in the last 10 minutes to secure a narrow 30-23 win.

The bottom line is that they are in a state of flux after the loss of experienced campaigners like Victor Matfield, Jean de Villiers and Fourie du Preez.

But they are also hampered by a whole new development - the racial quota policy imposed on the national side by the South African government, which forces coach Allister Coetzee to pick at least seven non-whites, including two black Africans, in each of his 23-man squads.

The longer term aim is for non-whites to make up half of all domestic and national teams by 2019, but when skin colour rather than merit alone dictates selection, Coetzee is at risk of having to field players who are simply not up to it, whether they are black, white, or sky blue pink.

Those in favour claim the quota is the way forward after years of racial bias in favour of whites. Those against say equal opportunity at grass-roots level is the answer.

Whatever, the Boks look a pale shadow of their former selves right now.

You wonder whether, being in the same time zone as the European nations, they may feel they should gravitate north in the future.... leaving the Rugby Championship goodness knows where.

The implications for Wales, and the other home nations

Potentially dire given that the Welsh Rugby Union and its northern hemisphere neighbours depend so much on the November fixtures for income generation.

Wales haven’t beaten the All Blacks since 1953, but even accounting for that there was a real air of exasperation in these parts after the 3-0 series slap-down this summer.

Each autumn New Zealand are the biggest draw of the southern teams, but for how much longer if supporters believe there is no way the usual outcome will change?

Similarly, how much appetite is there right now among Welsh fans for games against Australia and South Africa at the Principality Stadium?

The appeal of these matches has always been the fact that beating such nations would be a memorable feat for Wales.

Cynics will point to the results ledger and argue that is still the case, but when Wales toppled the Boks 12-6 in November 2014 it came against a backdrop of sniping about the supposed weakness of the tourists.

You can bet your life it will be the same this year given present circumstances – if it happens. Again, all bad for the Test game, all negative in terms of its ongoing appeal.

England? Eddie Jones’ men probably occupy a different bracket to the Celts right now.

New Zealand’s crushing of Australia would have been a reality check for them, but with such a powerful and harmonious domestic scene, such a cash-rich governing body and such a mine of playing resource to exploit, expect the Red Rose to stay in bloom for some time.

England remain firmly behind New Zealand, but you wouldn’t bet against them ruling the Six Nations for some years.

Two nations in rude health isn’t a recipe for the health of international rugby, however. The writing is on the wall, if national governing bodies choose to read it.

(Image: Getty Images)

Verdict

Test rugby is being sucked into the same vortex that swallowed its football counterpart years ago; clubs in certain countries are so powerful that they are beginning to ride roughshod over the international game.

English and French clubs bullied the unions into submission over the European Champions Cup and, for all World Rugby’s rules and protocols, are beginning to strangle the life out of Test rugby.

While the revival of England continues there will be few complaints at this end of the globe, but supremacy is hollow unless you are pushed to the outer limit by your rivals.

The Six Nations was dire last season. France’s threat is a thing of the past, Wales and Ireland were turgid, Scotland promised much but delivered little and Italy were useless.

England won the Grand Slam at a canter and who’s to stay they won’t do so again, for all their hiccups of the past?

Down south, a Rugby Championship of already questionable appeal is a now a one-horse race and even in the last World Cup no side came close to New Zealand save for Argentina when the holders were rusty in their opening encounter.

Take heed. The warning signs are there for the international game. Rugby ignores them at its peril.