Jonah Lomu has had to wait a long time for his All Black comeback, but on the 11th day of the 11th month the omens were always likely to be on his side last night. The world's most famous leftwing duly scored a try on his first appearance since his return from a rare kidney disease. If New Zealand's eventual half-century of points appeared modest compared with their 81-3 slaughter of Llanelli on Saturday, five tries in the final quarter underlined their strength in depth.
Lomu's moment to savour arrived in the 67th minute of a game which proved he has lost none of his relish for physical contact. It was to the home side's credit that they restricted the flow of points to a trickle in the first half, but Ireland will draw little comfort for their meeting with the first-choice tourists on Saturday.
After the siege of Stradey, few of those squeezed inside the Pontypridd ground expected much variation on the "Jonah swallows Wales" theme, but the home side did their best to alter the storyline in the early chapters.
The kick-off was boldly directed straight at the giant wing, a gambit which might have had more effect had anyone remembered to stay behind the kicker. And it was the Welsh number 11, Pontypridd's Dafydd James, who registered the game's opening try to the surprise and delight of his home supporters.
Lomu had just embarked on his first and only real trademark surge of the first 40 minutes, sucking his team-mates in behind him, when the ball slipped out on the Welsh side and was worked out to Gareth Thomas, who beat Walter Little and gave James the chance to race 40 metres past Todd Miller.
The conversion failed, but it was 21 minutes before the All Blacks got on to the scoreboard with a Carlos Spencer penalty for offside. Even their only try of the first half had an element of good fortune about it, James being forced to release the ball in a tackle on his own line which allowed Miller to score from a metre out.
Spencer's conversion and a second penalty on the stroke of half-time gave New Zealand a slim 13-5 half-time lead.
It all changed once the hooker Anton Oliver rumbled over in the 53rd minute, which released a torrent towards the Welsh line. The centre Scott McLeod was particularly impressive, touching down twice after linking impressively with Miller, but this was an occasion which one man will recall with more pleasure than any of his team-mates and it was Lomu's try which produced the biggest cheer of the night.
New Zealand coach John Hart insisted, however, that Lomu will not be rushed back into Test match action. The All-Blacks' side for Saturday's clash against Ireland in Dublin will be announced this morning, and Lomu did his cause no harm.
"Jonah showed plenty of pace tonight. It was an encouraging return, and certainly a step up from what I've seen from him in New Zealand," Hart said. "But I am a realist and I am not going to rush him - we will take things one step at a time.
"All credit to the Welsh forwards, they played well together as a pack," Hart said of New Zealand's opponents. "They put us under a lot of pressure, working very hard. But I always felt that if we increased the pace and eliminated errors then we would start to open them up."
