Was Saturday's All Blacks vs. Wallabies game one of the greatest ever?

Several pieces of the puzzle were there, for sure. We saw some superb skill. We saw comebacks. We saw tries scored a variety of ways. And there was all that drama, too, as New Zealand rallied for a thrilling 35-29 win over visiting Australia in Dunedin.

The Aussies ran out to a 17-0 lead, an advantage that most top test teams would expect to maintain. But the Wallabies were playing New Zealand, and in those three early tries there were indications of what was to come. The All Blacks were nicely on the front foot for the opener, before Israel Folau intercepted and went the distance.

Now, you won't see in these pages anyone saying an interception is a fluke. It's part of rugby, after all. But before the interception New Zealand was putting something together -- something fans would have done well to remember.



Next off, Australia won a lineout and its maul went nowhere. In fact, New Zealand's pack kind of splintered the whole thing. The only problem for the All Blacks was that Wallabies captain Michael Hooper had the ball in between the split parts, and he scampered in for the try.

And finally, scrumhalf Will Genia set up a beautiful try for flyhalf Bernard Foley, but lost in that was the fact that New Zealand's scrum was shoving the Aussie pack back. That chicken came home to roost as New Zealand clawed its way back and took the lead -- but only briefly.

With four minutes left to play, Australia went back in front after a try from Kurtley Beale and a missed conversion from Foley, who missed three conversions and a penalty altogether on the day.



The final moments were set for a try for the ages. Down 29-28, the All Blacks produced a bit more magic, as some wonderful interplay between captain Kieran Read and scrumhalf Thomas Perenara set up flyhalf Beauden Barrett for the winner.

It was pretty great. But greatest ever? Hard to say. This game was very, very much like one of the other candidates for that title: New Zealand's epic 39-35 win over Australia in Sydney in 2000. It started the same way (except that it was New Zealand that took the lead), with three tries in the opening minutes.

Australia didn't panic -- same response as the All Blacks on Saturday -- clawed back and led late. But then a bit of magic, this time by one of the most beloved rugby players of all time, Jonah Lomu. Have a look, what it tells you more than anything is, there are more games out there that could be the greatest.