That glorious infuriating heart-stopping Welsh roller-coaster never ceases to amaze, frighten and astonish in equal measure.

Until the beginning of September it had been totally inactive, sat at the bottom of the track rusting away with nowhere further to descend.

On August 5th a bit of WD40 had been applied as Wales beat England in Cardiff. It had started to climb for the first time in a long while before defeats at Twickenham, and at home to South Africa, derailed it once again.

A full service was required, and by September 9 two minutes into the opening match against Fiji it purred for the first time in ages. A 31-26 bonus point victory had put it back on track.

A week later the roller-coaster proved its reliability against Portugal, before hitting the breath taking heights with a big big win against Australia. The ride upwards continued with a bonus point win against Georgia.

We were hoping for the ascent to continue, and for twenty-one minutes in Marseille it really did, but sadly that old Welsh roller-coaster had reached the top of its climb and it was downhill from there on in.

The Rugby World Cup fair is over for Wales, and the covers have been put back on, but there is optimism that come early February that infuriating, heart stopping part of all our lives will be fully operational once again.

Wales, thank you for the ride, diolch.