England, combative up front but depressingly short on creative ideas, went down to a spectacular seven-try defeat here at the bottom of the South Island against an enterprising Academy side that were always capable of raising the tempo and scoring in demoralising bursts.
The England coach Clive Woodward admitted that the inept display told him more about whom to omit rather than whom to select for Saturday's first Test against the All Blacks in Dunedin.
England showed bulldog spirit in abundance, pulling back from 14-0 to 14-14 and later from 37-17 to 3832, but their willingness to keep battling against a superior outfit that combined power with flair was never enough to paper over the cracks.
To make matters worse, Wood ward blundered by substituting Scott Benton with Peter Richards shortly after the Gloucester scrum-half had raised England's morale with two splendid second-half tries.
The Academy players, most of whom took part in the recent Super 12 competition, appeared to inhabit a different mental universe, moving the ball seamlessly through forwards and backs and making off-the-cuff decisions that resulted in a succession of scintillating scores.
The Tonga-born No. 8 Isitola Maka, the scrum-half Byron Kelleher and the wing Bruce Reihana scored two tries apiece, emphasising their explosive skills with the kind of clinical finishing that Woodward can only dream of.
England's tight forwards, notably the Gloucester pair Dave Sims and Rob Fidler, applied good pressure in the set-pieces and drove a number of slow mauling trundles through the midfield, one of which yielded a try. However, England's back row was inadequate, their half-backs highly erratic and their quarters mostly incompetent. According to England's assistant coach John Mitchell, the critical areas of failure were ball retention, first-time tackling and tactical kicking which was so bad that it often invited the Kiwis to counter-attack down the flanks.
Woodward was critical of the way that the New Zealand official Colin Hawke refereed the scrums - where a penalty award led directly to a home try on two occasions - but there could be no excuses for shortcomings in basic skills.
"We were giving them a belting in the scrums - we were too powerful - and I was staggered when he penalised us," Woodward said. "That said, today we didn't see an equal match-up."
The New Zealand coach John Hart saw an astonishing contribution by Maka, who is surely an All Black in the making. Woodward must have had Maka in mind when he said afterwards: "Their players were tough, more physical and very skilful as well. You only have to look at them when they take their shirts off - their physical development is tremendous."
England's habit of giving away early scores before they have settled into a pattern must also be eradicated. Within 10 minutes of the kick-off, Maka and Kelleher each made a devastating break from the back of a ruck which led to tries.
England quickly bounced back with boldly constructed scores by the hooker George Chuter, who soon departed with a bruised collarbone, and Dominic Chapman, but before half-time the Academy surged back into a 28-17 lead thanks to further tries by Reihana and Maka.
The Academy went clear after Kelleher picked up a loose ball outside the England 22 and charged straight to the posts like a runaway train. But then Benton, aided by the accurate Tim Stimpson, who kicked 12 points in all, did his stuff with a brace of tries.
In the last seven minutes the Kiwis regained the initiative in style, Pita Alatini and Reihana both scoring after a brilliantly sustained build-up that England could only stand and admire.
