By Malachy Clerkin
Argentina 34, Ireland 23
Ireland’s World Cup conquerors came back to haunt them on Saturday night in Buenos Aires as Warren Gatland’s men made a losing start to their end-of-season tour of the Americas. Late tries from Martin Scelzo and winger Octavio Bertolucci meant that Argentine emerged victorious from a game that saw the Irish fade badly in the final quarter.
Ireland actually scored one try more than the Argentinians. Two tries from Justin Bishop and one each from Malcolm O’Kelly and Rob Henderson gave Ireland a platform from which they should have compiled a winning score. Out-half David Humphreys had a terrible day with the boot, however, scoring only once from six attempts.
It was a shame, because for long periods of the match, Ireland were the better side. Some of the play in the back division was excellent, especially from Shane Horgan and Henderson. That they lost should not perturb the Irish, as the evidence was there that a lot of what Eddie O’Sullivan works on in training is translating itself to moves on the pitch.
Bishop’s first try was evidence of this. The move began with Humphreys selling an outrageous dummy and transferring to Horgan. His burst attracted the attentions of three would-be tacklers before he offloaded to full-back Peter McKenna. His clever inside pass found Bishop who went over to round off an excellent move.
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All this good work counted for nothing, however, as Argentina outscored Ireland by 17 points to 5 in the last five minutes. And so, like Australia, France, Scotland and England before them, the Irish left the Estadio Ferro Carril Leste a beaten team. From Buenos Aires they have moved on to Manchester, N.H., for a match against the USA this weekend.