France have been left with a second-half mountain to climb after going into the break 29-13 behind against reigning Rugby World Cup champions New Zealand.
It was a bright start to the quarter-final tie for the All Blacks, who were able to get the first points on the board seven minutes in through a trademark Dan Carter pen.
Despite being hounded in their own half for much of the opening stages, France were able to level things up when Scott Spedding's mammoth kick from the halfway line punished some slack New Zealand play.
Just when Les Bleus looked to have found some momentum, turning over the ball and mounting an attack, Brodie Retallick charged down Frederic Michalak's kick to scoop up and score in the simplest of manners.
If that was not bad enough for Michalak, he picked up an injury in the process of his failed punt and had to leave the field, but the entertaining opening quarter to the match continued when Morgan Parra split the sticks to add three more points to the board.
Some real sloppiness was creeping into the All Blacks' game, which was perhaps a result of their lack of action against tier one nations so far at this showpiece competition, and they were almost further punished when Parra was gifted a second kick from 20 metres out.
The scrum-half was wasteful from the attempt, though, failing to find the target to the dismay of the many France supporters in attendance, which would ultimately prove costly.
Les Tricolours were beginning to grow more and more into things, yet in a sign of just why they are favourites to retain their title Steve Hansen's men found a second score of the evening through Nehe Milner-Skudder, who weaved his way beyond Spedding and Brice Dulin to become the joint-leading try scorer at the this year's World Cup.
Things went from bad to worse for the northern hemisphere side before the half-hour mark, as Julian Savea collected Carter's back-hand offload to run in for a third of the evening, before Carter maintained his imperious kicking record.
That took the world's number one ranked side up to 300 tries in this competition, but there was some hope to arrive late in the half for France thanks to Louis Picamoles' score, coming after a powerful drive over the line which the TMO was happy to award.
Yet France could not see the remaining minutes through and, in the dying stages, Savea brushed aside the challenge of three opposition defenders to regain his side's hefty cushion - albeit one that Carter could not add to with a rare miss.
Daniel Lewis
