England's World Cup dreams fell apart under a French onslaught on a night when their shortcomings were brutally exposed at the quarter-final stage. First-half tries from Vincent Clerc and Maxime Medard opened a lead of 16 unanswered points as England shipped penalties and made basic errors across the park. England struck back with a fine try from Ben Foden and closed to within seven points with three minutes left when Mark Cueto capitalised on a break from replacement Matt Banahan. But they ran out of time and inspiration as Les Bleus set up a deserved semi-final clash with Wales.