Ireland maintained their perfect record against Argentina in Dublin on Friday evening with a tight-fought 22-19 victory.
In their 756th test match, and the 20th meeting between Ireland and Argentina since caps were first awarded on 27 October 1990, Ireland held out at the death in a titanic final tussle.
Both sides had two men each sin binned on a night Cian Healy won his 133rd cap to join Brian O’Driscoll at the top of the list.
Two early Irish tries
In a much improved opening 40 minute performance from last week, Ireland opened the scoring on four minutes.
Jack Crowley, who had earlier been on the receiving end of a dangerous high tackle from Matias Moroni, which saw the centre sin binned for 10 minutes, opened the Irish try-scoring.
With Argentina down a man, Ireland aimed to exploit the wide space in front of them. A break from the home side was dominated by centre Garry Ringrose cutting through the Argentinian side. Tadhg Beirne received the ball yards from the line, but the Munster player unselfishly passed inside to Mack Hansen. The Connacht man had the easy task of touching down for his 10th international try in 23 test matches. On this occasion, Crowley’s conversion attempt was short and fell under the crossbar. This gave Farrell’s side a 12-0 advantage.
Albornoz opens Argentinian scoring
Ireland were penalised for being offside and this gave the Pumas an opportunity to claim their first score of the test match on 12 minutes. Benetton’s Tomás Albornoz dissected the posts to narrow the margin between the sides to 12-3.
Tadhg Beirne thought he had added to the Irish score minutes later when he stretched to touchdown, despite two Argentinian players tackling him. The referee, Paul Williams of New Zealand, called a try as the on field decision, but on review with the TMO, the ball was knocked on as Beirne attempted to ground the ball.
Bealham gets yellow card
Finlay Bealham was found guilty of a crock roll towards the end of the opening quarter of the game. Paul Williams reviewed the incident on the big screen where the Irish front row was clearly seen committing the foul. The Corinthians man was sent to the sin bin for ten minutes.
The penalty which followed was successfully kicked by Albornoz, his second of the night, leaving Ireland in a 12-6 lead.
Crowley kicked a fantastic drop goal from centre field on the stroke of 21 minutes to extend the home side’s advantage to 15-6.
With two Irish players blown for crossing, the visitors were handed another three-point opportunity which Albornoz took with aplomb; the score was Ireland 15 Argentina 9 by this stage, with the clock showing 26 minutes played.
McCarthy claims third Irish try
The men in green soon extended their advantage when Joe McCarthy claimed the side’s third try of the night. Coming from an Irish line out near the Argentinian try line, James Lowe at first looked as though he would be successful. Though he ended up being short of the try-scoring line, McCarthy was in support for the five-point score. Another good kick from Crowley meant the score board read 22-9 in Ireland’s favour at the break.
Half-time: Ireland 22 Argentina 9
Mallía try for Argentina
Individual brilliance from Argentinian fullback Juan Cruz Mallía created the space for him to claim his team’s first try of the game, after 45 minutes. The Toulouse player, with a 7s background, broke through an ailing Irish defence and easily took the five-pointer.
A straightforward kick from Tomás Albornoz brought his side to within six points of Ireland, with 46 minutes on the stadium clock.
Joe McCarthy became the second Irish player, and third of the game, to be shown a yellow card. The earlier try scorer was guilty of deliberately going offside according to match referee Williams.
Albornoz kicked his second three-pointer of the second half and brought the Pumas to within three points of Andy Farrell’s team.
Shoulder to head contact from Franciso Gómez Kodela on Caelan Dorris saw the Argentinian spend the final five minutes of the game in the sin bin, the fourth player of the night to spend time in the bin.
Both previously uncapped players Tom Clarkson and Sam Prendergast made their senior international debuts on Friday night, while Cian Healy claimed his 133rd test cap, joining Brian O’Driscoll as Ireland’s most-capped player ever.
Ireland now have 14 wins in games between the sides with Argentina having 6 victories.
