Last week I wrote about the virtual hangover I experienced the morning after a game. This time I can tell you I have been hungover again but for reasons that most people would recognise.

I suspect that it is widely known that I am teetotal. Well, I broke the habit of pretty much a lifetime after the game on Saturday night and had a bit of a blow-out. It was the first time in years and simply seemed the right time and the right thing to do.

A huge bond has been formed in this squad over the past few weeks and I didn’t want to break it. After most games here, people have done different things in different groups, but after the final on Saturday, it seemed right to remain as a group, all as close and tight as we have become. I am proud to have been in this team and in this squad and I wanted to show that.

It also helped to be together like that, to get back to the hotel and then go straight out again. Anything, I felt, rather than stop and ruminate on what had just gone before. There will be plenty of time, I know, when I’ll be feeling the pain of having lost the World Cup final, but our Saturday night was more a case of putting that off. We actually managed to have a lot of fun, but I tell you, I certainly felt rank as a result of it.

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South Africa looked like a team who had prepared for four years, England like a team who had prepared for four weeks

Simon Barnes

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BACKGROUND

• It’s widely known that I’m teetotal. I broke the habit on this occasion

• England take heart from brave new pretenders

• How England rated

• Miracle men suffer dose of reality

BACKGROUND

• England's future rosy, but is Ashton included?

• Toulon wait for Springboks master

• IRB aims to secure future not just for kicks

• South Africans urged to grasp chance for change

BACKGROUND

• Springboks dominate awards

• Boks on top in brutal battle

• Springbok kickers destroy England

• Ashton merits credit for glorious run

BACKGROUND

• It's over: dream dies as Boks win Rugby World cup

• Boks kill the unlikely dream

• Brave England go down with pride

• Video ref made 'brilliant decision’

BACKGROUND

• So who ate all the croissants?

• Au revoir France

• Victory whoops of the rainbow warriors

• Mrs Mills solves all your rugby problems

BACKGROUND

• English roses fall for Saint Jonny

• Stodgy England confine Bryan Habana

• Still joking about the All Blacks and Wallabies

• Wheels come off the chariot

Multimedia

• The World Cup Podcast

• Josh Lewsey's video diary

• The Rugby World Cup blog

Related Links

• Ashton: England have a bright future

• Miracle men suffer dose of reality

• England take heart from brave new pretenders

In any case, there had already been enough time for the events of the final to sink in. Being involved in the presentation ceremony, I feel, is important. It is important to respect and applaud the winners the way that Australia did for us. But it was a strange experience, standing and watching the South Africans and the presentation of the cup. I almost felt like a spectator, as though I wasn’t there on the pitch at all.

Then came that huge burst of fireworks. I cannot think of a time when my mood was less attuned to the bright colour and celebratory feel of a massive firework display.

Still, it remains the case that we have had an incredible journey just to get this far. My mindset before the final was that if we lost, getting there would mean nothing. But I’ve gone beyond that already. We achieved so much so quickly; that, I hope, will be my abiding thought and not the pain of the final.

Indeed, it was something of an achievement to get some of us there at all. The fact is that my right ankle — the one I turned in our first training session in Versailles all those weeks ago — has been giving me trouble throughout the tournament. I have been having treatment on it pretty much every day and, for the first time, I had to have treatment on it at half-time on Saturday.

Phil Pask, one of our physios, said that the rehab on the ankle here was three or four weeks shorter than he would have liked. Normally we would not have pushed the comeback so quickly, but I was up and running on it after only ten days and was patched up sufficiently to play in the Samoa game. The medics did a wonderful job.

When I get home, I am going to have to reassess the ankle and let it recover properly. Out here in France, I haven’t been able to kick on the right foot at all. I didn’t kick once on it in practice and I didn’t use it once in any of the games except for three dropped goal attempts that all missed.

I had one speculative dropped goal attempt off my right in the Samoa game, another against France in the semi-final that hit the post and the third was the long-range one in the final in which I didn’t have enough power.

The problem with my ankle cannot have helped in trying to find the required power there. Overall it is fair to say that it has limited my options here.

The trouble is that the cumulative effect of those clashes build. And the surface of the Stade de France — which is soft on top and hard underneath — is not what you want with an ankle like mine.

So it is back home for me now, recover properly and get myself into a position where I can start taking my rugby forward again. I need my ankle to clear first, and my head, too.