England thundered past the USA in the opening match of the Rugby World Cup, highlighting both the strengths of the host nation and World Cip contender, and the issues facing a USA team that's just simply not at that level.

As often happens in these types of games, the game was clearly a competitive test match for about 30 minutes. Watch that first half-hour and what you see are two very good rugby teams playing well.

At that point it was 14-7. But after that, England's efficiency started to take advantage of the fact that the Eagles were working enormously hard to defense and enormously hard to win ball. England wasn't working as hard because they were more in tune with what they need to do, and, overall, they were more physically powerful. 

The make up for that, the USA started to infringe, but they were under the cosh at that point. The first try came at eight minutes off a penalty and then a lineout. The USA's maul defense was ... poor. England took an angle on the drive and five Americans were out of the play. And everyone was too slow to react. England's second came with flanker Georgie Perris-Redding on the ground injured (she would leave the game and be replaced by Freda Tafuna). That instant offered a chance for England. They kicked wide, got a little lucky with a potential holding-on penalty that was not called, and burst through in tight.

The USA responded with a very picturesque try. Tahlia Brody offloaded to Bulou Mataitoga, and she passed quickly to lock Erica Jarrell-Searcy, who took off through a huge hole, got away from two potential tacklers, and galloped 43 meters to score. But with Alev Kelter in the sin bin the Eagles were backed up once more and the forwards did the rest. Almost directly off the restart, and still up a player, England spun it wide to exploit the overlap and poor Mataitoga found herself facing a three-on-one.

Superb interplay between Abby Dow and Ellie Kildunne resulted in Kildunne racing in. Those two tries as halftime beckoned stuck the knife in.

Up 28-7 England dominated the second half. The USA's unity started to fracture under pressure and fatigue. And as often happens in that situation, luck began to favor the team exerting the pressure.

Seven tries in the second half and a 69-7 drubbing.

It's worth pointing out that the USA had the ball. They had the ball more than England, in fact. They had more meters gained and, shockingly for such a blowout, more meters gained per carry. That is, until you realize that a team camped out on the tryline doesn't make a lot of meters, and a couple of long runs can skew that average. Still, 146 carries for 1,042 meters is a lot. England was 122 for 994.