Graham Henry’s men swept all before them in the Tri-Nations racking up 22 tries as the Springboks and Wallabies were both put to the sword while their last defeat to England came back in Martin Johnson’s playing days before the 2003 World Cup.

Confidence is also high in the English camp after their 21-20 defeat of Australia – their first victory in the Southern Hemisphere against Tri-Nations opposition for seven years.

But while it may seem there’s never been a worse time to face a rampant All Blacks, Best believes the timing couldn’t be better and believes England can catch them cold coming off the plane.

“I believe we have a very good and realistic chance that we can go out there about beat them,” said Best speaking at the launch of rugbycoachingdrills.com, a comprehensive, interactive, pooled coaching tool for all levels of the game.

“We don’t know what team they’ll bring over. We don’t know whether they’ll broaden their squad or maybe even rest players. So right now I really think we have a more than fair shout
against the All Blacks.

“It’s good we have them first. We don’t want them after four games when they’re a well oiled machine, we want them fresh off the plane and still suffering from the flight.

“They’ll be rusty having not played for seven or eight weeks and that’s when we need to hit them. We want them first and we’ll beat them.

“You can’t go out against New Zealand thinking about damage limitation.

“The All Blacks will get better as the series goes on, once they’ve got the cobwebs out of the way.

“When they get that out of the way, watch out.”