Argentina 9-13 England | Rugby World Cup 2011 Pool B match report

• Argentina 9-13 England • Watch World Cup video highlights, interviews and more • Browse our interactive guide to the venues and fixtures England made the shakiest of starts to their Rugby World Cup campaign by edging out Argentina 13-9 in a desperately tight opening Pool B game in Dunedin. The Pumas, hugely combative and committed, had looked the likelier winners until a 66th-minute try by replacement scrum-half Ben Youngs dragged England back from the brink. It might have been a different story had Argentina not missed six penalty attempts at goal, although Jonny Wilkinson also failed with five of his own. England, for long periods, were deeply unimpressive but will be massively relieved to have wriggled off the hook. Had they lost they would have faced a major battle to reach the knock-out stages but victory over Scotland in Auckland on 1 October should now ensure they finish top of their pool. Until the Pumas started to fade in the final quarter, Martin Johnson’s side were in all sorts of strife. The first-half was particularly brutal. Argentina lost Felipe Contepomi and Gonzalo Tiesi to injury and hooker Mario Ledesma did well to play on following a nasty collision with Courtney Lawes. England also fell badly foul of the referee Bryce Lawrence, who awarded the Pumas a string of penalties and sent Dan Cole to the sin-bin in the 34th minute. Argentina’s kickers, though, could not take full advantage with Contepomi and Martin Rodriguez missing four penalties and a drop-goal between them in the first 40 minutes. England made little headway in attack and wasted their best scoring chance when Ben Foden broke clear only to fail to put Delon Armitage clear on the left. The Pumas extended their advantage to 9-3 five minutes after the interval courtesy of Rodriguez’s second successful penalty. On a bad night for kickers on both sides, however, Wilkinson missed four successive penalty attempts and England continued to look a side lacking wit and imagination. It took the arrival of Youngs and Matt Stevens to reverse the tide, much to Johnson’s relief. Rugby World Cup 2011 Argentina rugby union team England rugby union team Rugby union Robert Kitson guardian.co.uk

Posted by on September 10, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.