England secure series win in Argentina as replacements combine for last-ditch crossing
England claimed a famous 2-0 series victory over Argentina as a late Jack van Poortvliet try helped them to a 22-17 win at the Estadio San Juan del Bicentenario.
Tries from Seb Atkinson, Freddie Steward and that Van Poortvliet effort at the death were added to by seven points from George Ford as the series was won in San Juan.
Lucio Cinti and Ignacio Mendy crossed for Los Pumas who will be bitterly disappointed to come out on the losing side for the second straight week against their visitors.
There was a tweak to England‘s team for this game after Jamie George was called up by the Lions, which meant Theo Dan started and Curtis Langdon made the bench.
That was only the second alteration to the XV that won last weekend with head coach Steve Borthwick keeping the faith with the players that impressed seven days ago.
England started the match sprightly and were 7-0 up with just four minutes on the clock when Ford’s cross-kick found Tom Roebuck and the ball eventually made its way to Atkinson for the try. Ford slotted the extra two points to extend the arrears before Santiago Carreras landed a long-range penalty soon after that reduced the gap.
Ben Curry was then issued a yellow card for making contact with the head of Argentina back-row Pablo Matera and fortunately for him there was no change in card colour.
Argentina managed to capitalise on the numerical advantage when scrum-half Simon Benitez Cruz found a hole and had Cinti on his outside for a score that made it 10-7.
However, England struck back on 33 minutes as they showed good width in their attack which created space for the impressive Will Muir to find full-back Steward on the left wing for the score. Ford was on-target from the touchline with the extra two and the visitors had their four-point buffer restored in front of a passionate crowd.
It looked like the English would take this cushion into the changing rooms at the turnaround but a fortuitous moment from Los Pumas saw them grab the lead late on. A speculative chip over the top from Carreras clipped the post and bamboozled Steward in his in-goal and Mendy was sharpest to react to make it 17-14 to the hosts.
England came out for the second half with similar purpose to the first but were denied on more than one occasion by some stout Los Pumas defence near their own line.
Borthwick’s charges did get something for their dominance as a ruck offence handed Ford the opportunity to level matters from close range, which he did on 53 minutes.
Five minutes later Argentina were reduced to 14 players as Matera was sent the sin-bin following a series of team offences on their own try-line as England threatened. However, that seemed to galvanise the home side as they came through that period unscathed thanks in part to some heroic defence which denied Van Poortvliet a score.
The match remained deadlocked at 17-17 as it entered the closing 10 minutes, with the series being on the line certainly adding to the tension and style of both countries.
But it was England who deservedly came out on top as replacement Guy Pepper’s line break and offload set up Van Poortvliet for a dramatic try that secured the series.
The teams
Argentina: 15 Benjamin Elizalde, 14 Matias Moroni, 13 Lucio Cinti, 12 Justo Piccardo, 11 Ignacio Mendy, 10 Santiago Carreras, 9 Simon Benitez Cruz, 8 Pablo Matera, 7 Juan Martin Gonzalez, 6 Santiago Grondona, 5 Pedro Rubiolo, 4 Guido Petti, 3 Francisco Gomez Kodela, 2 Julian Montoya, 1 Thomas Gallo
Replacements: 16 Bautista Bernasconi, 17 Mayco Vivas, 18 Pedro Delgado, 19 Lucas Paulos, 20 Facundo Isa, 21 Benjamin Grondona, 22 Agustin Moyano, 23 Nicolas Roge
England: 15 Freddie Steward, 14 Tom Roebuck, 13 Luke Northmore, 12 Seb Atkinson, 11 Will Muir, 10 George Ford (c), 9 Ben Spencer, 8 Tom Willis, 7 Sam Underhill, 6 Ben Curry, 5 Alex Coles, 4 Charlie Ewels, 3 Joe Heyes, 2 Theo Dan, 1 Fin Baxter
Replacements: 16 Curtis Langdon, 17 Bevan Rodd, 18 Asher Opoku-Fordjour, 19 Chandler Cunningham-South, 20 Guy Pepper, 21 Alex Dombrandt, 22 Jack van Poortvliet, 23 Cadan Murley
Referee: Luc Ramos (France)
Assistant referees: Angus Gardner (Australia), Gianluca Gnecchi (Italy)
TMO: Mike Adamson (Scotland)
FPRO: Olly Hodges (Ireland)
