The All Blacks avenged a historic home series defeat at the hands of Ireland last year, taking their chances when they had them in clinical fashion at the Stade de France to reach a semi-final against Argentina.
The defeat ended Ireland’s run of 17 successive Test victories and denied Andy Farrell’s team the chance of reaching the last four for the first time in their history.
“You’ve got to work hard for fairytale endings and we didn’t get it but that’s life,” 38-year-old Sexton said.
“We left no stone unturned, we ticked every box, trained the house down, and played pretty well tonight. But fair play to the All Blacks.”
The All Blacks turned on the pressure early on, pounding away at the Irish line and it told as referee Wayne Barnes awarded them a penalty which Richie Mo’unga slotted over for 3-0.
The All Blacks moved into a 6-0 lead near the quarter-hour mark as Jordie Barrett landed a superb long-range penalty from just inside the Irish half.
Ireland did pierce the New Zealand defence on a couple of occasions but their discipline let them down and it was their opponents who were turning their chances into points.
They moved into a 13-0 lead after a superb move resulted in Leicester Fainga’anuku - who was only in the lineup due to Mark Telea’s breaking of team protocol - touching down.
There was a hint of a forward pass from Rieko Ioane but the try stood and had the New Zealand coaching team out of their seats punching the air in ecstasy.
Mo’unga converted from the left touchline.
The Irish needed something and sensibly Sexton, when offered the chance, took the points, converting a penalty for 13-3 in the 23rd minute.
Sexton and Barnes had an exchange when Mo’unga’s high tackle on Bundee Aki was judged OK - the latter was to hit back in the best way possible.
The Irish were right back in the game. James Lowe’s long pass found Aki who took it high but managed to break through several tackles and touch down and Sexton converted for 13-10.
Irish sloppiness punished
However, back came the All Blacks and the outstanding Ardie Savea went in in the corner to mark his 30th birthday in style. Though Mo’unga’s conversion went wide, the All Blacks were 18-10 up.
With perhaps just 45 minutes left of his rugby career remaining, Sexton read the riot act to his teammates, berating them for the lack of cover.
They reacted positively and got a boost when Barnes yellow-carded Aaron Smith for a deliberate knock-on as Ireland were pressing and Sexton went for touch with the penalty.
It paid off as having kicked to touch shortly afterwards with another penalty Jamison Gibson-Park saw a gap and seized the opportunity brilliantly to go over and touch down.
Sexton added the extras to bring Ireland within a point at 18-17 at the half-time break.
The Irish had the better of the opening exchanges in the second half but twice were penalised by Barnes - Sexton having words with the English referee on the latter occasion.
As in the first half, the All Blacks proved clinical in punishing them for those errors - Will Jordan finished off a brilliant break by Mo’unga and Jordie Barrett landed the conversion for 25-17 with 25 minutes remaining.
Things just weren’t going Ireland’s way as Sexton opted to go for goal but sent his penalty wide as groans rang round the stadium.
Farrell decided it was time to give veteran Conor Murray a go and partner Sexton, as he has done for the majority of their outstanding careers.
Sexton, having gone for touch with another penalty, waved his arms in the air to gee up the Irish supporters.
It worked as the decibel levels went into another stratosphere, even more so when Barnes awarded the Irish a penalty try and sin-binned Codie Taylor to leave it 25-24 with 16 minutes to go.
But Jordie Barrett crucially stretched the lead to 28-24 with 11 minutes remaining with another long-range penalty.
The Irish pounded away in the dying minutes, but the All Blacks stood firm and 38-year-old Sexton was left to contemplate what might have been as the whistle blew on his extraordinary career.
New Zealand coach Ian Foster said: “We all knew it was going to be a monster game. It was a real arm wrestle.
“They’re a proud team, Ireland, they really hung in there. I thought we had them a couple of times but they kept making the game really tight.
“I am so proud of the way we played. Our defence, particularly in that last part, was brilliant.”
Wales rue ill-discipline in ‘devastating’ defeat by Argentina
Meanwhile, Wales coach Warren Gatland was left ruing his side’s ill-discipline after falling to a 29-17 World Cup quarter-final loss to Argentina in Marseille also yesterday.
Emiliano Boffelli’s 19 points from the kicking tee, allied with tries from Joel Sclavi and Nicolas Sanchez, were enough to see Los Pumas past a Wales side for whom Dan Biggar and Tomos Williams crossed for tries.
Biggar, playing his 112th and final Test, added seven points with the boot before coming off five minutes from time.
“They are a tough team to put away and they hung in there with some fight,” Gatland said of Argentina, who qualified for the quarter-finals as runners-up to England in Pool D and will now take on New Zealand in the semi-finals.
“It was an incredibly tough Test match that could have gone either way. We had opportunities to win the game.”
Gatland added: “We spoke about how important discipline was and it kept them in the game and the scoreboard ticking over.
“If you don’t take your chances and keep the scoreboard ticking over, they’ll come at you.
“They defended well. I thought they were a bit out on their feet before half-time but a couple of penalties allowed them back into the game. That for me was a bit disappointing, those couple of soft penalties.
“We went into the game with a lot of confidence... it’s not to be, but that’s sport. It’s the way Test match rugby goes.”
One that slipped away
Gatland said the team were “all pretty gutted”, saying it had been “a missed opportunity” to advance into the last four.
“It’s one that slipped away from us. You’ve got to take learnings away from it,” said the Kiwi, in his second tenure as Wales coach after a highly successful first spell from 2007-19.
“We’ve got a game against the Barbarians (on Nov 4) and then we’ll focus on the Six Nations, we just make sure we don’t take a backwards step.”
Co-captain Jac Morgan called the result “devastating”.
“We knew they were going to be a physical team but discipline and a couple of errors let us down,” the flanker said.
“We let them into our half and they capitalised on that. We let them have more possession and they got points out of it.”
Dewi Lake, the other co-captain, added: “We’re gutted as a group from missing out on the final four, all the work we’ve done over the past four months to get to this point.
“At the start of the campaign not many people thought we’d get out of the group and we came into this game as favourites.
“Full credit to Argentina. They left everything out there as did we but our accuracy let us down a bit.”
Gatland took over as coach for the second time with Welsh rugby in disarray, with turmoil between the union and regional clubs, alongside a raft of off-field problems.
But he transformed a losing team into one that won all four of their Pool C games and Gatland insisted that that was a positive to take away from the team’s French adventure.
“They should hold their heads up, they should be proud of what they’ve done,” he said of the Welsh players.
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