Quite simply one of the most outstanding and astonishing days in the history of rugby. After Saturday's famine came yesterday's feast, and if the first semi-final had been a gem of its kind, France's stunning defeat of the favourites New Zealand in the second semi-final at Twickenham was a priceless collector's item.

Despite giving it one of their best shots and confounding almost everyone outside their own camp in the process, France found themselves trailing by 2410 five minutes into the second period thanks almost exclusively to a double whammy from Juggernaut Jonah Lomu out on the left wing.

Whereupon France hit the All Blacks with everything they had, and in the process scored a scarcely-believable tally of 33 unanswered points.

They began by steadily eating into the All Blacks' lead through a couple of quick drop goals by Christophe Lamaison and then a couple of penalties, before scoring three tries to blast New Zealand out of the tournament.

The under-siege French management will now, extraordinarily, be able to take a bow, for they had clearly done their homework on the All Blacks' defensive system and exploited it to the full - all three tries coming, significantly, from clever use of the boot.

First off, New Zealand worked an elaborate and needless counter-attack off Lamaison's missed touch kick, Wilson leaving himself in not so splendid isolation. From the turnover, the composed and always intelligent Fabien Galthie (what were the French management doing by not naming him in the team earlier in the tournament?) chipped to the blind side where the brilliant Christophe Dominici gathered a wicked bounce one-handed ahead of Andrew Mehrtens to round the posts.

Even when trailing, during Lamaison's barrage of three-pointers, the French crowd had launched into several uplifting versions of the Marseillaise. Now Allez les Bleus reverberated around Twickers, with perhaps even a few Rosbifs taking part, and the All Blacks completely cracked.

Confidence began oozing through every French pore now, and no-one's more dangerous in such a mood. Their pack took on their All Black counterparts at a line-out, mauling them back 20 metres to the New Zealand line, and from Galthie's pass Lamaison spotted that Jeff Wilson was fanning out wide and put through the deftest of chips for Richard Dourthe to beat Wilson to the touchdown.

Finally they withstood a ferocious, expansive and, it has to be said, thrilling All Black riposte; Lamaison hacking on from a fumble by the appalling Tana Umaga (from Andrew Mehrtens' short pass). The quicksilver Olivier Magneled the footrush, and this time Philippe Bernat-Salles beat Wilson to the touchdown.

Suddenly it was 43-24 to France and not even the All Blacks could escape from this. A well-taken try by Wilson in the last minute was but a token gesture. The hum from the French scoring blitz lasted long after the full-time whistle.

It was thrilling stuff, which undoubtedly only France could have produced - certainly amongst the reeling Northern Hemisphere sides. In the process they've given not only themselves but also European rugby and the World Cup an incomparable shot in the arm.

In all of this, it has to be said that New Zealand naively, nervously and perhaps even a tad smugly, completely and utterly lost the plot. As the 24-10 lead evaporated, Mehrtens kept giving his forwards close-range restarts rather than making territorial gains, and likewise he and the outside three persistently ignored the percentage game by running ball inside their own half.

John Hart must have been tearing his hair out. Perhaps they'd had too easy a ride up until this juncture, but they undoubtedly buckled under pressure.

France ably demonstrated, as only they can, that the only way to rattle these Blacks is to attack them at every opportunity. The sun shone, the Marseillaise and the Haka provided the best pre-match pageant there is and, rising to the occasion, the French were patently fired up.

A huge hit by Galthie on Christian Cullen indicated as much, though the flip side of this coin was France's poor discipline. Referee Jim Fleming gave a first-half penalty count of 13-2 against France, and bore the brunt of the crowd's displeasure, both from the vocal French contingent and neutrals who had adopted Les Bleus in response to their thrilling approach. In truth, it was hard to fault the vast majority of Fleming's decisions, the French paying scant regard to the rucking laws which prohibit handling of the ball on the deck, and being over-eager in their desire to contest the vulnerable New Zealand throw-ins.

They did draw first blood with a Lamaison penalty after three minutes, whereas Mehrtens (whose heavy-legged performance and heavily-bandaged left knee suggested he was far from right) hit the post and was wide from longer range before drawing them level after nine minutes.

Xavier Garbajosa was even yellow-carded for killing All Black ruck ball close to the French line before Mehrtens kicked New Zealand ahead, but the French had put together some good continuity by then and it was clear that the ultra-physical Abdelatif Benazzi and the lightning-quick Magne were up for it in a big way.

Galthie kept exploring the blind side, suggesting that France had identified a potential Achilles heel in the favourites' defence. Dominici found a huge hole inside Umaga there, before mesmerisingly beating both Mehrtens and Wilson before Cullen caught him. From the recycle though, Dourthe stood in a t scrum-half and his reverse pass enabled Lamaison to ignore a big overlap outside him to round the posts. Now the French had belief and the crowd were with them.

Even so, the All Blacks had Mehrtens to punish ill-discipline with a couple of penalties before the break and in between these scores they also had Lomu. Umaga had chased a towering box kick by the initially lively Byron Kelleher, Josh Kronfeld then following-up to nab Dominici.

Kelleher and Cullen quickly moved the ball to Lomu, who skipped around Bernat-Salles in deftly gathering, and then handed off Lamaison. Emile N'tamack didn't want to know, and despite bouncing off Benazzi and practically stopping, Lomu re-accelerated to plough through four French players near the line.

Five minutes after turning around with a 17-10 lead, Wilson then gathered a loose Lamaison kick on half-way, and looped around Lomu before giving him a return pass inside. The juggernaut went into over-drive, leaving Marc Lievremont, Lamaison and Xavier Garbajosa in his wake like frightened rabbits to score his second.

The All Blacks should never have lost from there, they were at least partially authors of their own destruction, and they'll know it. But that's by the by.

A feature of the history of the World Cup is that each tournament throws up one veritable cracker in the semi-finals. France have been involved in a few of them, and after their heartbreak of four years ago, when Benazzi came inches short (if at all) of a decisive try they heartily deserved this.