Justin Marshall issues last-minute warning for the All Blacks

Justin Marshall is as aware as anyone ahead of New Zealand’s Rugby World Cup semi-final against Argentina that his former team is “expected to win, should win and will win if they play the rugby they are capable of”. But the man who won 81 All Black caps also knows better than most that things can go horribly wrong in a heartbeat.

“The reality is how quickly you can be hit in the face when you are cruising in this tournament,” Marshall said with a rueful smile as he contemplated the similarities between the situation the current All Blacks side finds themselves in and those he faced as a player.

“In both cases in my experience of semi-finals, 1999 against France at Twickenham and again in 2003 against Australia, both of those sides we’d had no problems with leading up that tournament. In fact, we’d put 50 on Australia in Sydney seven weeks before we played them in that semi-final,” he recalled.

“We were clearly a better side than both those teams but on that day both of those sides had performances that were out of the gate, that were outside of the way they’d been playing and simply because they were super big-time underdogs in those matches.”

In 1999 the French, inspired by the two Christophes, Lamaison and Dominici, produced one of the all-time great World Cup comebacks to see off Marshall et al 43-31 and four years later, Elton Flatley steered Australia to an equally shocking 22-10 win.

While Marshall does not predict a similar outcome for the All Blacks at the Stade de France on Friday night. Not only was the quarter-final display against Ireland an “absolute complete performance” and not “far off” perfect but Argentina also haven’t experienced the “tempo or the intensity” the All Blacks will bring. He is, however, acutely aware he didn’t see either of his semi-final heartbreaks coming. Or indeed New Zealand’s shock loss to England in Yokohama four years ago.

“You can be in very good rhythm, that you can be on top of your game and you can be beaten really quickly by a side that shouldn’t beat you,” he said. “That’s how quickly a semi-final can flip on you.

“And Argentina are capable of that.”

The other aspects that most concerns Marshall is his compatriots’ recent history of following real highs with genuine lows, especially given it was Los Pumas who benefited from such fluctuations in form little more than 12 months ago.

“Quite clearly that performance at Ellis Park last year (35-23 win versus South Africa), turning around and putting in one hell of a performance showed they have got it in their

DNA. But then the following week they went back to New Zealand and lost to Argentina at home in Christchurch (25-18),” Marshall said. “Some of the results in the last two years are not flattering. That does not mean one performance results in this fear and this aura coming back.”

While “everybody is already talking about who they are going play in the final” Marshall is desperate that the All Blacks focus on reproducing the intensity and accuracy they found in the 28-24 quarter-final over Ireland last weekend.

“They still need that performance. They can’t fluctuate. They need to send a statement, not only to themselves, but to the world that they can operate at that level every week,” he said.

Do that and they will avoid the ignominy of the third-fourth place playoff – Marshall admits he was never “less motivated and so demoralised leading in to a test match” than when he had to lace up his boots for those clashes – and the All Blacks will instead head to the final everyone back home is “expecting”.

Although, he does not mind a bit if England upset the formbooks in the other semi-final.

“I think they’d prefer not to play South Africa mate,” Marshall laughed. “They are not a side you want to meet in the final. They are the ultimate foe.

“It would be a blockbuster of a final should it eventuate though.”