Scotland Summer Tour, Game 3: Argentina v Scotland, 21 June

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Argentina v Scotland  
20 June 2014, KO: 16:10 ART (20:10 BST)
Estadio Mario Alberto Kempes, Córdoba
 
Live on Sky Sports 3
 
Referee: John Lacey (Ire)
Assistant referees: Pascal Gauzère (Fra), Lourens van der Merwe (SA)
TMO: Deon van Blommenstein (SA)
 
A. Teams:
 
I. Argentina

1- Bruno Postiglioni (La Plata)
2- Julián Montoya (Newman)
3- Matías Díaz (Highlanders)
4- Manuel Carizza (Stormers)
5- Matías Alemanno (Tablada)
6- Rodrigo Báez (Liceo)
7- Javier Ortega Desio (Parana)
8- Tomás De la Vega (CUBA)

9- Tomás Cubelli (capitán) (Belgrano)
10- Nicolás Sánchez (Bordeaux Begles)
11- Manuel Montero (Pucurá)
12- Santiago González Iglesias (Alumni)
13- Matías Orlando (Huirapuca)
14- Santiago Cordero (Regatas)
15- Lucas González Amorosino (Oyonnax)

16- Santiago Iglesias Valdez (Uni Tucumán)
17- Lucas Noguera Paz (Lince RC)
18- Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro (NG Dragons)
19- Tomás Lavanini (La Plata)
20- Antonio Ahualli de Chazal (Uni Tucumán)
21- Martín Landajo (C.A.S.I.)
22- Matías Moroni (CUBA)
23- Joaquín Tuculet (Bordeaux Begles)

II. Scotland

15 Stuart Hogg (Glasgow Warriors) 22 caps, 5 tries, 1 penalty, 28 points
14 Sean Maitland (Glasgow Warriors) 11 caps, 1 try, 5 points
13 Nick De Luca (Biarritz) 41 caps, 1 try, 5 points
12 Peter Horne (Glasgow Warriors) 3 caps
11 Tommy Seymour (Glasgow Warriors) 8 caps, 3 tries, 15 points
 
10 Duncan Weir (Glasgow Warriors) 13 caps, 1 try, 3 conversions, 1 penalty, 1 drop-goal, 17 points
9 Grayson Hart (Edinburgh Rugby) 1 cap
 
1 Alasdair Dickinson (Edinburgh Rugby) 34 caps, 2 tries, 10 points
2 Ross Ford (Edinburgh Rugby) 75 caps, 2 tries, 10 points
3 Geoff Cross (London Irish) 30 caps, 1 try, 5 points
4 Jonny Gray (Glasgow Warriors) 3 caps
5 Grant Gilchrist (Edinburgh Rugby) 6 caps, 1 try, 5 points CAPTAIN
6 Robert Harley (Glasgow Warriors) 4 caps, 1 try, 5 points
7 Blair Cowan (London Irish) 2 caps
8 Kieran Low (London Irish) 3 caps
 
16 Pat MacArthur (Glasgow Warriors) 5 caps
17 Gordon Reid (Glasgow Warriors) 2 caps
18 Jon Welsh (Glasgow Warriors) 2 caps
19 Tim Swinson (Glasgow Warriors) 7 caps
20 Chris Fusaro (Glasgow Warriors) 2 caps
21 Henry Pyrgos (Glasgow Warriors) 10 caps, 1 try, 5 points
22 Tom Heathcote (Edinburgh Rugby) 3 caps
23 Dougie Fife (Edinburgh Rugby) 1 cap
 
B. Numbers - head to head:
 
13 Played 13
9 Won 4
4 Lost 9
247 Points 218
 
C. Results
 
25 September 2011
Wellington Regional Stadium, Wellington
13 – 12 to Argentina
2011 Rugby World Cup
 
19 June 2010
Estadio José María Minella, Mar del Plata
9 – 13 to Scotland
2010 Scottish tour of Argentina
 
12 June 2010
Estadio José Fierro, Tucumán
16 – 24 to Scotland
2010 Scottish tour of Argentina
 
28 November 2009
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
6 – 9 to Argentina
 
2009 Autumn International
14 June 2008
Vélez Sársfield, Buenos Aires
14 – 26 to Scotland
 
2008 Scottish tour of Argentina
7 June 2008
Gigante de Arroyito, Rosario
21 – 15 to Argentina
 
7 October 2007
Stade de France, Saint-Denis
19 – 13 to Argentina
2007 Rugby World Cup
 
12 November 2005
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
19 – 23 to Argentina
2005 Autumn International
 
18 November 2001
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
16 – 25 to Argentina
 
21 August 1999
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
22 – 31 to Argentina
 
11 June 1994
Estadio Ricardo Etcheverry, Buenos Aires
19 – 17 to Argentina
 
4 June 1994
Estadio Ricardo Etcheverry, Buenos Aires
16 – 15 to Argentina
 
10 November 1990
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
49 – 3 to Scotland

funnyExiledScot wrote:If we're within 10 points at the 10 minute mark I'll be happy. Please tell me it isn't on Sky Sports 3 again though!

You're OK - it's on Sky Sports 1 next week.

If the match appears on YouTube, is it worth watching?

Our 2 tries are very good.
Performance as a whole less so. Still lacking the cutting / clinical edge which should have seen us motor out of sight.

Worth bearing in mind though that if that chip had set up for Seymour we score under the posts and go 14-0 up. As it is we didn't get the bounce and some brilliant counter attacking by Argentina and they get the try.

Similarly all of Weir's missed kicks didn't help. 8 points gone a begging (could have been 11 if we'd gone for the posts rather than touch in the second half). Including that crucial kick to go in ahead at half time.

Also when was the last time we came back to win a game when we were 9 points down with only about 15 minutes to turn things around? That was impressive, especially given it was away from home with a very partisan crowd.

Yes we'll get shafted by the Boks next week, but I do feel a good bit happier than last 2 weeks.

Thought Gilchrist had a great match, would have been motm had Seymour not created both tries.

Ford carried well and Gray was always willing.

Probably shouldn't have won but we did, so I'll take it.

I would not say we robbed them, it was a tight game that could have gone either way. It was good to see them come back into it and we did finish the match looking the stronger team, probably the value of having some fresher players than the last couple of weeks.

Seymour has been the player of the tour no doubt and is looking increasingly like he has nailed down one of the wing spots.

I thought Gilchrist lead very well. His carrying and tackling were very impressive and outplayed JG for once. Maybe the long season has finally caught up with him.

Henry is definitely an under rated and under appreciated player, both for Glasgow and Scotland and made a big difference when he came on. He is not as flashy and eye catching as Niko and Cus but he rarely has a bad game and also has a knack of scoring important tries. Hart looked a little off the pace, not necessarily surprising for a first start and tried to do to much himself.

Weir had a mixed game. He won the game with a nerveless kick but also missed a few that he should have got. Still making mistakes unfortunately and could not really get the line moving that well. Horne I did not think played very well either and just does not look the same player yet. He certainly looks like he has been brought back to international rugby to soon.

Got to be pleased with the win though. It is never going to be easy to win in Argentina. Ireland struggled with a much stronger team than we put out and we can't underestimate what the travelling and mix matching takes out of the players. 3 wins from 3 is pretty much all we could have asked from this tour. Whatever happens next week we can be happy with that.

To earn respect you gotta win matches. Players are going to remember a win , other sides won't necessarily have watched the match and will see the win. It's important. Scotland are not respected currently because they just don't win the matches - no matter how agonisingly close we tend to come, often consecutively.

You can't ignore performance completely and we've been here before with summer tours. The AIs with full squads, expectation on the home side (us) and weathered SH teams will be more telling and traditionally we've not fared well. So while we can't be happy with just the wins, it's a good start and certainly better than the "good play, still lost" alternative.

Weir has a knack for nailing last minute kicks. Is he a better sub than starter? You can see Russell 10 Weir 22 working in a way.

Pyrgos I agree is underrated. Is he also a good impact sub? I'm not fan of Laidlaw but Laidlaw 9 Pyrgos 21 is also a varied approach, no bad thing. (Worth noting Laidlaw has a knack for making breaks or scoring in important moments - although if he released his backline more he might not have to)

Gilchrist from what I saw played really well and the captaincy did not phase him one bit. J Gray & Gilchrist the boiler room of the future? R Gray needs to get his head screwed on I'm afraid. There's only so far noticeable hair will take you.

I feel like Scotland's psychology is slowly getting better over a period of years. We've seen several last minute wins now - something Scotland used to do in reverse - and barely any matches "thrown away". When we have lost it has tended to be comprehensive or you can just see it coming by the end of the first half. I really feel that good teams win even when they are playing badly and we're kind of getting there.

As above, AIs and 6Ns will be a better measure but I'm looking forward to seeing if we can front up to SA. Let's not forget Cotter is a SH man so he might have a few tricks up his sleeves.

Ranking points earned, some respect earned (aren't we 3/3 in Argentina now?), plenty learned about the players and the coach has had valuable time with many of them. Let's get this last match done and get the boys home for a rest before the next season begins. It's going to be a huge season with the WC in it.

Now I think about it Scotland do seem to struggle with consistency through a season. If we do well in the summer our autumn is woeful. If our summer was a bit pish our autumn exceeds expectations etc. So what I really want to see is front up to SA and NZ and to beat Tonga and Arg - I don't care how - in the autumn. We need a run of sensible RESULTS leading up to the WC. For this side 2 6N wins will also be confidence enough to take us home from the group stages of WC and it's knockout rugby thereon in so who knows.

Biggee - Seymour player of the tour after he's played 1 game yeah?  

If the tour ended now we'd be very happy indeed. The SA game has been hanging over everyone the entire tour.

Well, the supporters. Who knows what the players think about it.

A lot of negativity on here. We played rubbish and won. Normally when we play rubbish we get hosed. So the fact that we were mince and still won I'm pretty chuffed.

Gilchrist made a few dopey decisions as captain but looked solid and played well. Ford had a good game and despite the commentary I thought Cowan and Low played well.

Seymour gets special singling out, he was outstanding.

I thought Hart, Cowan and Low done well. Cowan seemed to be the only one willing to stand up to the Argentina physicality and show some aggression. The restarts looked better, apart from a couple of lapses. I would have liked to have seen Heathcote get game time.

However once again we were our own worst enemy. Too many basic errors in the opposition 22, something we really need to work on.

Low reminds me of Denton - big strong laddie but not much between the ears. Denton is just that much bigger and stronger. That was Low's best game for us though.

My biggest concern was losing the ball regularly in their 22 - something we've done all tour.

Our tries were excellent but the chances of those kind of tries happening against better opposition are slim, so what we need to do is regularly make something out of chances in their 22. We do the opposite - lose the ball.

We'll really struggle against better opposition if we keep doing that

RDW_Scotland wrote:

Our tries were excellent but the chances of those kind of tries happening against better opposition are slim, so what we need to do is regularly make something out of chances in their 22. We do the opposite - lose the ball.

We'll really struggle against better opposition if we keep doing that

Totally agree!

At the moment I don't see us doing anything other than trying to avoid the Spoon in this years 6 Nations. That said Cotter has had a chance to work with the players now and if he didn't know what a tough job he had before he took the job, I would guess he does now.

Still 3 wins is 3 wins, just wish the players were getting to come home today as I think the squad would gain more from an extra weeks rest than heading to South Africa for what is an utterly pointless Test match for us.

Anyone found highlights of the match anywhere?

SRU Twitter and Facebook page has highlights merged Sith interviews, and they'll be on YouTube too.

Well either way, I'm looking forward to the SA game. If the boys can up their game and keep their structure there's no reason Scotland can't compete! Bare in mind that last year they gave the Saffers a good run under Scott 'no flies on me' Johnson, hopefully they can do the same this year. I'm comfortable as I'm not expecting a win going into this game at all. They just need to do themselves justice, they're all good players who can step it up. Based on Arg my starting lineup wouldn't change too much except at scrum half and obviously the back row has to change. I think Weir deserves another chance.

Looking back without Seymour we would have lost. I think Bennett could do what deluca did if not green but I'm not convinced maitland visser evans or obv lamont would have created / used chances like that.

Team game of course but after that he's the man to beat on the wing

Maitland has very good skills but I'm not convinced he's doing enough in attack. Visser may not be great in defence but he does score tries.

Didn't think De Luca was great, his pass for Hogg's try was top drawer but a moment later he lost the ball in contact.  

Really missed Scott & Dunbar, haven't had anyone to straighten the line and get us over the gain-line. Horne has tried but he's just not big enough, always willing to try but been getting smashed.

Prygos made a huge difference, really controlled the tempo and deserved his try.

Shaping up well.

I think Low played quite well considering he's not normally an 8, little of the barnstorming Denton type play but he offers a lot in the lineout and he seemed to be good at the restarts. Cowan also played pretty well, he gets through a lot of work.
Pyrgos did well but Hart wasn't as bad as some would suggest, both improving players who will feature on a regular basis I'm sure. Cusiter is first choice but those two for me offer more than Laidlaw at 9.
Heathcote surely deserves to play against SA (lucky him?) as Weir is so inconsistent.

Full match

Euan Murray, Tyrone Holmes and Adam Ashe have been called up.

Has Ashe even played for Glasgow??

RDW, for this match I'm surprised the YOUR MATCH XV haven't been asked if they have Scottish grannies. But how much older and experienced than   is Ashe anyway?
Just wait till ASBO hears about that.  

I think its been mentined here before, but Scottish players could really do with some kind of sports phycologist. We just seem to panic or get really nervous during games. The amount of times we kick possession away or panic and make a mistake, when playing through the phases would lead to a try. The ability is there we just need to stop panicing when we get into those positions. It surely can't be coaching/game plan to kick away as much ball as we do. I hope.

Just watched the video of the game. Definitely a marked improvement from last week, which is probably due in large part to these players knowing each other well. Not stunning rugby but from Italy to Argentina, we do seem to be developing the ability to win games - which is change!

Here's how I'd rate the players:


15 Stuart Hogg 6 - Fairly quiet but didn't do anything wrong

14 Sean Maitland 6 - Defended well but was once again quiet in attack

13 Nick De Luca 7 - Looked composed, handled well and put Seymour in for the try

12 Peter Horne 4 - Anonymous and missed 2 tackles

11 Tommy Seymour 9 - MOM by a mile, looked dangerous with every touch. Is really devloping

10 Duncan Weir 6 - Misses kicks but controlled pretty well considering

9 Grayson Hart 3 - Had a very poor game. Crabbed and made poor decisions.

1 Alasdair Dickinson 5 - Pretty quiet but didn't let the side down at scrum time

2 Ross Ford 6 - Carried well and hit his man for the most part

3 Geoff Cross 5 - As per Dickinson

4 Jonny Gray 5 - Looked pretty knackered after a long season

5 Grant Gilchrist 7 - Didn't make much ground but led pretty well and did well at the lineout

6 Robert Harley 7 - Looked very busy and made a nuisance of himself

7 Blair Cowan 8 - Was very impressed by him. Was everywhere

8 Kieran Low 4 - Doesn't really look up to international rugby yet

Subs:

16 Pat MacArthur 5 - Didn't add much but didn't do anything wrong

17 Gordon Reid 6 - Shored up the scrum when he came on

18 Jon Welsh 4 - Did he come on?!

19 Tim Swinson 5 - Not much time to make an impression

20 Chris Fusaro 5 - As per Swinson

21 Henry Pyrgos 8 - Has to be the starting 9 in SA. Composed, made the right decisions and took his try well. Made the 3rd most meters with only 35 mins. Prefer him to Laidlaw and Hart

23 Dougie Fife 6 - Looked ok but no more

I'd give the FR 7, SR 6, BR 6, SH 5, FH 4, Seymour 8, Horne 4, NDL 7, Maitland 6, Hogg 6

I don't think Horne is fully cut out for international rugby, unfortunately.

So South Africa 31 - 30 Wales.

Bok backlash next weekend?

Steve Walsh hopefully won't be playing for them next weekend. He was devastating.

Sounds like a hell of a game!

Joel Stransky describing game vs Scotland as ‘confidence booster’ & ‘chance to blood youngsters.

That's our motivation for next week   

Might seem strange but if I was Welsh, I'd have hoped for a poorer performance to rid the likes of Phillips and encourage more youngsters into the squad. Wales, when they get it right, are evidently a great team, but their lack of depth and WG's persistent selection of the old guard is truly detrimental to their RWC prospects.

Hang on, we don't have Seymour next week do we?

  

Tbh SA could probably beat us with their U20 side...

So we're looking at something like Dickinson, Ford, Welsh, Gray, Gilchrist, Harley, Fusaro, Holmes, Prygos, Weir, Fife, Horne, Hogg, Maitland, Murchie; Allen, MacArthur, Murray, Swinson, Ashe, Hart, Heathcote, Scott Johnstone?

Thought we did have Seymour?

Holmes won't be at 8 nematode - he's a small openside. The only option we really have is Harley at 8 and swinson at 6

Also, we've got De Luca!

Third from left

Yeah but there was no suggestion anywhere that he'd be going home after one game

Quick question, if you were the likes of Bennett, Eddie or even RV, Lee Jones, would you rather get a first cap/play again for Scotland vs SA, or play in the commonwealth games 7s? Don't suppose another chance will beckon for Eddie, Jones or RV