That was pretty forgettable, with a rusty England and a poor Argentina doing little to enthuse the Twickenham crowd. Still, it’s a win, eh? So, I’ll be off. It’s been a blast. A small, somewhat disappointing blast. He’s some further reading, courtesy of Paul Rees. Bye!
Mako Vunipola, the man of the match, who made 20 tackles and worked like a hound, has a word:
It was a scrappy game. You’ve got to hand it to Argentina, they’re a good team and you can’t just expect to rock up and put the points on them. We had to dig deep and we’ll take the win, even though it was ugly. It’s a win, first and foremost, and then Monday we’ll look at what we need to work on. We know there’s a lot to work on before Australia.
Dylan Hartley talks:
Plenty to work on. The win’s the main thing today. Defensively we obviously want to keep a clean sheet, so disappointed with conceding. There’s obviously stuff to work on. Ball in hand, we need to get into the right areas of the field and then treasure the ball. Ball retention is something we need to focus on going forward. We definitely need to take it up a level next week.
Final score: England 21-8 Argentina
90+2 mins: It’s done, and England have won their first Autumn International without really turning on the, or indeed any, style.
80+1 mins: Argentina have bossed these last few minutes. England just can’t get the ball.
79 mins: Sanchez misses the chance to convert his own try, clipping the outside of the post.
TRY! England 21-8 Argentina
A long attack – some 35 phases, we’re told – ends with Nicolas Sanchez bursting over the line!
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77 mins: England keep making their tackles. Argentina, though, still have the ball, and are still pushing.
75 mins: Danny Care wins the ball and immediately loses it again, and Argentina have the ball five yards out. For the first time today, England have some serious defending to do.
74 mins: Argentina have an injured player receiving treatment in the middle of the pitch, but play continues around him.
72 mins: Argentina push for a bit, but Courtney Lawes grabs the ball and won’t let go, and at the end of it England have the scrum.
71 mins: More kicking practice for Argentina, Alex Lozowski punished for a shoulder charge. They kick for touch this time.
Converted! England 21-3 Argentina
That was an excellent conversion from way out on the right. Will England – and, by extension, us – now have some fun in the final 13 minutes?
TRY! England 19-3 Argentina!
67 mins: The replays were inconclusive, but the referee gives England the benefit of the doubt!
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TRY! Or is it?
Slade passes to Rokoduguni wide on the right, and he dives over the line! But was it a forward pass?
66 mins: Lovely run from Lozowski! He spots a hole in Argentina’s defence and speeds through it and downfield!
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65 mins: Argentina win, and miss another penalty. Nicolas Sanchez, who has only recently entered the fray, is the culprit this time. Their kicking has been atrocious.
62 mins: But they can’t make it count, and England win a scrum.
61 mins: Argentina attack! Gonzalez Iglesias bursts down the right and there’s some lovely work as the ball is worked back inside, before the referee punishes a tackle on Macome. Argentina go for the corner.
58 mins: This time Boffelli’s effort misses the posts by about 15 yards.
57 mins: Another scrum falters, but this time it’s England’s fault – Dan Cole’s to be precise – and Argentina have a penalty, from which they’ll have a kick. The second half has been pretty flat and entirely scoreless, though possibly not for long.
57 mins: Joe Launchbury and Benjamin Macome, the two No19s, are both on the pitch as replacements.
56 mins: Another poor pass from England, Anthony Watson the culprit this time, sending the ball behind its target.
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55 mins: Another England line-out, but after it’s safely caught Dylan Hartley fumbles under pressure from Creevy.
54 mins: There are currently 10 people in a pile on the try-line. The referee doesn’t like it, and blows his whistle.
54 mins: Another scrum fails, and this time England have a penalty, which is swiftly kicked out of play near the corner.
52 mins: Again, England sweep from right to left, and Slade passes it in front of Mako Vunipola and out of play.
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48 mins: The players have spent the last two minutes preparing for a scrum, and still haven’t got it right. Argentina have been punished twice for assorted infringements.
44 mins: England sweep the ball from right to left, but the umpire punishes Slade for a forward pass that looked obvious at the time but only marginal in replays.
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41 mins: They’re back! Argentina “haven’t offered anything” in the first half, says Clive Woodward – they look like a team short on confidence, as well as quality.
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Half time: England 14-3 Argentina
Solid rather than sizzling from England, but Argentina look limited and haven’t helped themselves with a couple of poor kicks. Ford’s excellent pass to set up the one try was the moment of the half, by a distance.
38 mins: A nice little interchange of passes ends with Rokoduguni misjudging his, which goes over Watson’s head. England keep the ball, but lost their momentum.
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England 14-3 Argentina
35 mins: This one sneaks just inside the right-hand post, and England’s lead reaches double figures.
34 mins: Henry Slade spilt the ball after being tackled before it even reached him, so England get the choice of two possible penalty locations. They pick the one nearest the posts …
33 mins: A no-arms tackle is spotted by the referee, but he allows play to continue long enough for Ben Youngs to chip the ball over his nearest opponents which briefly looks like it might lead to something more exciting, but the ball is spilt.
31 mins: And another Argentina penalty, after a scrum collapses. This one is from wide on the right, and Hernandez screws this one off target as well.
28 mins: Which Hernandez unaccountably misses! It wasn’t exactly straight, but neither was the ball too challengingly wide either.
Nathan Hughes scores. pic.twitter.com/rwtMTxiJxc
— England Rugby (@EnglandRugby) November 11, 2017
27 mins: Argentina are on the foot straight away, and win themselves a penalty!
25 mins: Ford hits the post again with the conversion.
Afternoon @Simon_Burnton. England haven't really fired yet, have they? They will. It still feels strange not seeing Dan Lucas' name (and boyish enthusiasm) on these pages today. So sorely missed.
— Guy Hornsby (@GuyHornsby) November 11, 2017
Very much so, Guy.
Try for England! England 11-3 Argentina!
24 mins: It’s Nathan Hughes, lurking out on the right and found by Ford’s fantastic long pass, who takes the ball and powers over the line!
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23 mins: Brown isn’t coming back. Semesa Rokoduguni comes on.
22 mins: Both sides are down to 14 men at the moment, with Brown off for assessment.
22 mins: Marius van der Westhuizen decides it wasn’t a realistic challenge for the ball, and Tuculet gets a yellow card!
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22 mins: The incident is repeatedly reviewed, with 82,000 people gasping “ooooh” every time they see Brown’s head hit the ground.
22 mins: Brown rises to catch a high kick, and is caught by Joaquin Tuculet on his way down, landing simultaneously on his knee and his head, and staying down.
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21 mins: It has now: there’s a scrum 10 yards from England’s tryline, but the English drive it forward and then boot the ball downfield.
17 mins: I don’t think the ball has got within 25 yards of either end, except when propelled by a boot.
16 mins: Another crunching tackle from Underhill, which topples Lavanini like a beaver might topple a slender birch. Only quicker.
England 6-3 Argentina
14 mins: Makes it look easy. Which, to be fair, it probably was.
12 mins: Joseph latches onto a loose ball and Matera stops him from releasing it, giving England another penalty, in front of the posts and 35 yards out.
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England 3-3 Argentina
10 mins: Now Underhill is punished for not rolling away, and Emiliano Boffelli thumps the penalty over the bar effortlessly from 40 yards or so.
8 mins: Sam Underhill gets the crowd gasping, by taking down Santiago Gonzalez Iglesias in most emphatic style.
England 3-0 Argentina
7 mins: And Ford nails this one!
6 mins: The crowd is pretty quiet as they watch a slightly thud’n’grunty opening. But Creevy doesn’t release the ball after he’s tackled, and England have another penalty.
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3 mins: He hits the post! The ball plops down to Matera, whose clearing kick is weak.
2 mins: England are awarded a penalty and George Ford will have a go, from distance.
1 min: England get the game started, and Ramiro Moyano catches cleanly.
Preliminaries complete, now for some sport.
The last post has sounded, a minute’s silence held. It’s anthem time.
The players are in the tunnel. Jerusalem has been sung.
“I fell asleep for about 25 minutes, but from what I saw it was an excellent movie.” Anthony Watson’s review of Murder on the Orient Express isn’t going to make the posters, I fear.
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A reminder of the teams:
England (v Argentina): M Brown (Harlequins); A Watson (Bath), J Joseph (Bath), H Slade (Exeter), E Daly (Wasps); G Ford (Leicester), B Youngs (Leicester); M Vunipola (Saracens), D Hartley (Northampton, capt), D Cole (Leicester), G Kruis (Saracens), C Lawes (Northampton), C Robshaw (Harlequins), S Underhill (Bath), N Hughes (Wasps).
Replacements: J George (Saracens), E Genge (Leicester), H Williams (Exeter), J Launchbury (Wasps), S Simmonds (Exeter), D Care (Harlequins), A Lozowski (Saracens), S Rokoduguni (Bath).
Argentina: J Tuculet; R Moyano, M Moroni, S Gonzalez Iglesias, E Boffelli; J-M Hernandez, M Landajo; S Garcia Botta, A Creecy (capt), N Tetaz Chaparro, M Alemanno, T Lavanini, P Matera, M Kremer, T Lezana.
Replacements: J Montoya, L Noguera, E Pieretto, B Macome, L Senatore, G Betranou, N Sanchez, S Cancellere.
Referee: Marius van der Westhuizen (South Africa).
Assistant referees: Nigel Owens and Dan Jones (both Wales)
Here it is...
— England Rugby (@EnglandRugby) November 9, 2017
Your England team to take on @lospumas in the opening match of the #OMWSeries 🌹
Full story ➡️ https://t.co/SxaZ3FnNkw pic.twitter.com/EXHsBBqWeS
#GiraNoviembre #ENGvARG
— Los Pumas (@lospumas) November 11, 2017
A las 12 hs del mediodía juegan @lospumas ¿Dónde lo vas a ver?#JugamosTodos pic.twitter.com/X7feOZDtHI
Hello world!
Autumn international? It’s basically winter. Have you not been outside? Anyway, it’s England against Argentina, a team that Eddie Jones is terrified of. “What makes them so dangerous,” he explained in the build-up, is that “they’ve had a terrible season”. Oh, for the pleasure of playing a really good team that’s had a good season. What an easy afternoon that would be – and indeed will be, when Australia turn up next week. So here’s Argentina’s recent record in full, starting when they played New Zealand in Hamilton last September:
LLLLWLLLLLWLLLLLL
That’s 15 defeats and two wins, against Japan and Georgia. “They’re desperate because they’re under the pump,” Jones said. “They’ve had a terrible season and they want to atone for that. They’re going to be tactically smart. They know how to move the ball and they can kick well, so we know it’s going to be a tough old game.” Do we know that? Do we?
Anyway, here’s what Robert Kitson thinks about the game:
It is not a precise comparison but, as Japan proved so memorably against South Africa in the opening game of the 2015 Rugby World Cup in Brighton, the longer Jones has to prepare for a specific game the more interesting the results tend to be. Anyone even mentioning Australia this week has been shoved instantly back in their box, microphone askew. The Pumas are the only current target, not least because they will be sharing England’s pool in Japan in 2019.
The corresponding fixture last year did not pan out as planned, the game barely five minutes old when Elliot Daly became the first England back to be given a red card at Twickenham. Vunipola also departed prematurely with a knee injury and Dan Cole’s sin-binning reduced the home side to only 13 men at one stage. They won 27-14 but ultimately it was more an exercise in crisis management than crisp perfection.
Two high-scoring summer Tests in Argentina subsequently saw England triumphant in the absence of their Lions players, adding a further layer of expectancy to this latest reunion with the Pumas. Jones is fully respectful of Argentina’s own pent-up motivation but does not have infinite time in which to tinker before the gravitational pull of 2019 intensifies.
Which is why, in every sense, he is demanding a fast start now.
Read more here:
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