Not even the Wales and Fiji players could quite comprehend the stunning spectacle we witnessed in Stade de Bordeaux on a sweltering Sunday night.
“I don’t think my vocabulary is good enough to describe that, I need to decompress and work out what that was like to play in,” said Wales centre George North.
He was not the only one who needed to reassess a World Cup game for the ages.
It ended up as a Wales bonus-point victory but could easily have ended up being the same result for the opposition, following a late Fiji fightback from 32-14 down to 32-26.
The collective noise at Stade de Bordeaux, as Fiji centre Semi Radradra dropped the ball with the Wales tryline at his mercy in the final play of the game, will live long in the memory of everybody in attendance.
The final whistle brought a moment of reflection from the captivated crowd before a thundering and deserved round of applause rang around the stadium for both sides.
Eight tries and 58 points were shared in this battle of Bordeaux that did not end until after 11pm local time. It evoked memories of the 38-34 epic Fiji victory that dumped Wales out of the 2007 World Cup in Nantes. Just a different victor emerged on this occasion.
As thousands of Wales fans celebrated across the city long into the early hours of Monday morning in the bars of Bordeaux, there was plenty to digest.
Morning after the night before
Head coach Warren Gatland had talked about the significance of the victory immediately after the game. His thoughts were echoed by forwards coach Jonathan Humphreys on Monday morning, with not much sleep had in the Wales camp as the adrenaline still flowed.
“That game was massive for us,” said Humphreys.
“I don’t think many people probably gave us a shot at that game, but we had a belief.
“We had worked extremely hard. We knew to an extent what Fiji were going to bring, but it is still so hard to stop them. Their footwork is so…
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