A polar vortex is forming over Trans-Tasman rugby relations.
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The Wallabies-All Blacks rivalry has been characterised by respect throughout its history. It has been grudging, at times. Fractious, during the height of Quade Cooper's young-and-dumb years. But there has almost always been respect.
Saturday's revelations that a reportedly active, concealed listening device was found in a hotel meeting room used by the All Blacks have the potential to plunge that relationship into turmoil.
The explosive discovery, now under investigation by NSW Police, calls into question the integrity of the Rugby Championship and the international game.
If the All Blacks were, as they believe, the target of illegal surveillance and if the Australian Rugby Union had, as chief executive Bill Pulver stated on Saturday, nothing to do with the planting of the device, then World Rugby has a problem on its hands.
After the match-fixing scandals that rocked tennis, cricket and football, to say nothing of the NRL's probe into the same problem in rugby league, World Rugby cannot turn a blind eye to any questions thrown up as a result of this investigation.
But already that probe is on the back foot, because the NZRU and its chief Steve Tew sat on their disturbing discovery for five days before telling anyone. Their host union, competition administrators, police, or the game's international governing body.
The All Blacks found the device, planted in a chair at the Intercontinental in Double Bay on Monday. It is understood Tew told his Australian Rugby Union counterpart, Bill Pulver, on Friday night. But when a New Zealand newspaper published the story online on Saturday morning, the day of the first Bledisloe Cup Test, the NZRU had neither spoken to the police nor to SANZAAR, the administrators of the four-nation Rugby Championship.
Not surprisingly, SANZAAR have issued the NZRU with an urgent 'please explain'. If the All Blacks were spied upon, this is much bigger than a suspicious waitress and a bout of food poisoning, or some pre-game mischief-making. Did the NZRU fail to see that?
That they appear to have leaked it to a journalist on the eve of one of the biggest Tests in this season's calendar, before informing law enforcement agencies or competition administrators, suggests so.
Tew held a short doorstop outside the Intercontinental in Sydney on Saturday afternoon, by which time he had the sense to make clear the NZRU were not making "any accusations of anybody, so there's no room for denials".
The damage to the game, to the ARU and to Saturday's Test match, was already done. As former Wallaby and commentator Matt Burke said, the incident had the potential to represent a "turning point in what we thought was a pure game".
"With everything that's happened in the world of betting and underworld betting agencies, you wonder if it's a bit more sinister than just knowing team tactics," Burke told the New Zealand Herald.
"This is definitely a blight on what is regarded in Australia as a classic contest."
Oh, that's right, there was a Test match on in Sydney. Did we mention that the Wallabies slumped to their biggest loss to New Zealand on home soil and their fourth-straight Test defeat this year?
That they conceded 42 points and six tries and scored just one, or that they lost Matt Giteau, Matt Toomua and Rob Horne to injury, all in the first half?
The All Blacks were at their imperious best at ANZ Stadium, led by a new generation of players with cool heads and sublime skills, most notably Beauden Barrett. The Wallabies were powerless in response.
Unfortunately, Saturday will be remembered for neither of those performances. It will always be the day someone was caught spying on the All Blacks.
