2015 Rugby World Cup: New Zealand power crush France 62-13 to move into semis

Julien Wing of the All Blacks is delighted after the win

The All Blacks turned on the style at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff as they trounced France 62-13 to move into the semifinals of the 2015 Rugby World Cup with a scintillating display of rugby.

Winger Julian Savea was the wrecker-in-chief as he scored a hat-trick of tries to power his side to a convincing win. Already, the leading try scorer in this year's competition, Saves is now out on his own with eight tries.

There was much talk of the two sides' meeting here eight years ago at this very same stage where France had caused a shock upset over New Zealand, but the All Blacks were in ruthless form tonight to allow such a thing to happen again. Running in nine tries, the massive victory was the biggest ever in the knockout phase of the Rugby World Cup.

The defending champions got off the blocks very quickly and dominated the early part with Dan Carter opening the scoring with a penalty kick after seven minutes. France equalized with a penalty of their own from Scott Spedding immediately, but Brodie Retalick opened the try-fest after he successfully charged down a clearance from Frederic Michalak to cause the turnover and score the try.

This gave New Zealand a 10-3 lead after 11 minutes. It was a double whammy for France who not only conceded the try, but also lost Michalak to injury. Though Morgan Parra reduced the deficit by three with his penalty, Nehe Milner-Skudder soon danced his way past the French defence to score New Zealand's second try.

Carter converted and the lead was 11 after just 25 minutes. Savea then began his onslaught, the first of which came after he collected a nifty offload from Carter before mowing down three defenders in his path for the touchdown.

Just before the breakthrough, France looked to have grabbed a lifeline when Louis Picamoles scored France's first try to pull the deficit down, but New Zealand hit back immediately with Savea scoring his second to take the All Blacks to 29-13 ahead at half-time.

France's hopes of a comeback in the second half suffered a severe setback when, possibly their best player on the night, Picamoles was yellow carded for balling his fist into All Blacks skipper Richie McCaw's face.

And they were made to pay as Jerome Kaino ran around on the left corner to score. Savea then grabbed his third to seal the hat-trick after Dan Coles intercepted and the loose ball was tossed to Savea who sped away for the easy try.

Number seven came from Kieran Read after the assist from Charlie Famuina on 65 minutes. Carter added his fifth conversion.