It was the arm wrestle to beat all arm wrestles but, All Blacks, you are World Cup Champions.
World Cup champions!
It was not pretty, ugly at times, but the All Blacks won the World Cup final at Eden Park last night with a tight, extremely tight, 8-7 win over a gallant French side.
The All Blacks did not play their best game of the tournament, ahead 5-0 at the break, but just did enough to win the match against a French side which threw everything, and the kitchen sink, at the New Zealand team.
The game was a typical final, with the All Blacks showing the signs of an extremely tough past three months.
There were few line breaks, neither team gave an inch in the second half and, if anything, the French shaded the game in the second 40 minutes.
But this was the All Blacks' time. It was somewhat ironic that the much maligned Stephen Donald was the difference between the two sides.
Donald, on for an injured Aaron Cruden, knocked over a penalty goal early in the second half and that was enough for the victory.
The home side muscled up in defence in the final 15 minutes when the French had all the ball but the men in black just did not break.
With four minutes to go the French turned the ball over and the All Black front eight refused to give it back.
The French eventually conceded a penalty, the ball was kicked out and, from the resulting lineout, the All Black forwards just ran the clock down and the glory was theirs.
Best for the home side was loose forward Jerome Kaino while centre Conrad Smith was solid in defence. Prop Owen Franks got through plenty of work.
The French were brave, none better than No 8 Imanol Harinordoquy and his fellow loose forwards Thierry Dusautoir and Julian Bonnaire. Lock Lionel Nallet was huge. Out the back, centre Aurelien Rougerie ran hard.
The All Blacks just could not get any field position in the second half.
Much of the game was played between the two 22m lines and the teams just seemed to go from one lineout to the next.
The All Blacks lacked ambition in the second half and reverted to the box kick which got little return as the French simply caught the kicks and rolled back up field.
The home team did not look to move the ball wide and the French defence stood firm around the ruck.
The French got back into the game early in the second half when All Black halfback Piri Weepu had one of the moments where his brain went into explosion mode.
He tried to kick the ball to a spare man but succeeded only in putting the ball into Francois Trinh-Duc's hands. The Frenchman skipped away and the attack was eventually lowered just short of the tryline.
The ball was then moved again by the visitors and captain Dusautoir scored beside the posts.
Trinh-Duc converted and the French were back in the contest, just one point behind but they could never catch up.
The only points of the first half came after 15 minutes and it was from something of an unlikely source.
The All Blacks swung on to attack from a nice Weepu touch-finder.
At the lineout the ball went to the back to Kaino who then expertly in-passed to prop Tony Woodcock, who ran into a gap even a Filipino ship captain could see.
The big prop simply strolled over to score from 6m out to give the All Blacks the first and, as it turned out, the only points of the opening 40 minutes.
The French were playing truckloads better than they did in the semifinal - they could have hardly been worse - but the crowd was quickly getting into the game and the confidence in the boys in black was starting to rise.
If only Weepu had his kicking boots on as he missed three chances, costing his side eight points, inside the first 25 minutes.
The All Blacks had plenty of ball and territory in the first half but were going up route one and not looking to move the ball too wide. They would have been well ahead if it was a boxing bout.
But it was not, and it started to get damn tense, too tense for many.
The home side was making the advantage line but there was much to admire about the French defence.
The French did get a sniff of points with five minutes left in the half but replacement first five-eighth Trinh-Duc was well astray with a dropped goal attempt from 30m out.
Both sides lost their first five-eighths in the opening period, with French pivot Morgan Parra going off with a head knock after he ran into the legs of Ma'a Nonu.