New Zealand face a massive task defending their women's Rugby World Cup crown on home turf next year, after suffering a successive record defeat to England at Northampton.
Hooker Amy Cokayne scored a hat-trick of tries, as the English used their forward dominance to pound the Black Ferns into submission, en route to a 56-15 victory.
Seven days earlier, the home side had prevailed 43-12, a scoreline that send shock waves through the NZ squad, showing just how far the northern hemisphere teams had progressed in the two years since they last faced the world champions.
In 2019, the Ferns beat England 28-13 at San Diego, California, but haven't played internationally during the COVID-19 pandemic, while the Roses have won consecutive Six Nations titles.
Ferns coach Glenn Moore made six changes to his team for the return fixture, notably bringing veteran speedster Portia Woodman - topscorer at the last World Cup tournament - back from injury.
England led 28-0 at halftime and added another converted try, before the NZ women finally scored through Woodman. Olympic sevens teammate Stacy Fluhler also crossed, before Woodman capped her comeback with another try right on fulltime.
They were momentarily interruptions in a torrent of English class and captain Les Elder was clearly stunned.
"We're guttered," she says. "It's hard to lose two on the trot like that - just not good enough really.
"We showed glimpses of good rugby, but our error rate and being able to phase it together for longer periods of time were really crucial, and we just weren't able to do that."
Elder is reluctant to use the two-year absence as an excuse for the defeats.
"I don't think we've had that mentality, but test match footy is a whole other ballgame - it's a huge step up from what we've been playing back home and this just shows we need to play more of it.
"We need more test matches."
Elder will get her wish next week, when her team face France - probably the next biggest threat to their world championship aspirations - at Pau.
The French beat the Ferns 25-16 in their last encounter at Chula Vista.
