Rugby videos of tackles, tries, funny incidents and more: Argentina upset France

Saturday, September 08, 2007

Argentina upset France - Corletto try

Argentina upset hosts France in the opening game of the 2007 Rugby World Cup last night.

It was a scrappy encounter in which France looked totally unprepared amazingly, showing a lack of ability to change gameplan when needed.

Argentina showed great guts and commitment though, tackling for their lives and desperate to once again make the point that they should be taken seriously in world rugby.

Fullback Ignacio Corletto finished off this try after a loose pass from the french. Showing great pace and a brilliant running line, Corletto effectively put the game beyond reach of the favourites.

After holding off the hapless French in the last 10 minutes, when the final whistle blew the underdogs showed true elation, but didn't get too carried away, with captain and fearless leader Augustin Pichot calming them down and reinforcing the fact that theres a whole lot more work to be done in this tournament.

The Argentinians have arrived.

Labels: Argentina, World Cup 2007

Lets go Argentina, once more showing to the world of rugby that its a great team, from that great hit against ireland in 1999 argentinas rugby keeps growing and growing, defeating france in marseille, england in twickenham, and now this great victory against the hosting team.
Its time Pumas are taken seriously by IRB and included ina high competition every year.
The Pumas are the team with most team spirit, they are amateur and play for the love for the jersey they wear.
VAMOS LOS PUMAS, CARAJO!!!!!

By Anonymous, at September 08, 2007 5:58 pm
^^have to agree. argentina need to be let into a major tournament as they are a major rugby nation.

By Anonymous, at September 08, 2007 8:09 pm
amateur? ya rigth... love the pPumas, dont take me wrong... but they are not amateur...

By Rui Barrenho, at September 08, 2007 8:38 pm
Well done Argentina that was a real upset for the French and the best thing was that Argentina played the better rugby. To me it looked as if France were more than willing to throw the ball aroung willy nilly, as if they didn't want the ball because they were scared of getting injured in the first game. I believe that Argentina have single handedly ended Frances world cup campaign by beating the at home, on the opening night of the world cup! frances game improved deep into the second half but by then it was too late the game was wone. I hope France learn from this because, despite me being Enlgish, France ARE a good team! Come on England woop tose Boks!!! WooHoo

By Anonymous, at September 08, 2007 9:15 pm
The french crack under pressure... after such a match i guess that fact.
By the way, Los Pumas are not amateur, but still they were raised here in argentina, and believe me... amateur spirit can be seen even in seven year olds..

VAMOS LOS PUMAS MIERDAA

By Anonymous, at September 08, 2007 9:33 pm
What?! They're amateur?! Bullshit! The most parts of Pumas play in France... I'm French and I have just one thing to say: Congratulation, you play an ideal tactic against us but in fact it's the French who was too much absent-minded and... ungainly!

Don't forget one thing: the Bleus are always better when they're put in front of the worst situations. French Flair will talk...

Please, excuse my poor english.

By Anonymous, at September 09, 2007 7:27 pm
Ok man, I'm frecnh too.
But the french staff sucks, that's a fact.
Laporte and Maso are living on aznother planet only relating what they said before the game.

French falire? It will become soon a legend. Laporte killed in trying to copy south nations way of playing.

Damn, it s not our culture to play like this. Heymans, Clerc, Poitrenaud. Let them play.

Laporte set up at team "to beat Argantina on her own strength".

What did we wee during the whole game? French forwards trying to beat theses powerful argentinian. What a stupidity.

4 yeas after the lost semi final agaisnt angland, we didn t improve. That s the point.
Laporte, hurry up! Exit please!

By K, at September 09, 2007 11:11 pm
Pour répondre (c'est moi qui est écrit l'avant dernier message):

J'ai pas saisi non plus le pourquoi de l'absence de Clerc et surtout Poitrenaud.

Quoi qu'il en soit c'est seulement maintenant que j'entends des gens s'en prendre à Laporte... c'est pas la tactique française qui a fait défaut (quoique frileuse c'est vrai...) mais c'est l'individuel... j'ai souvent vu des fautes de mains hallucinantes de la part des bleus mais ça disparait en général durant le match, alors que là c'était affreux de maladresse individuelle autant dans les passes que dans les renvois et sur l'ensemble de la partie si ce n'est à chaque possession française.

Les Argentins ont eu juste assez de roublardise et de connaissance de notre jeu pour nous la mettre. Point barre.

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 12:13 am
I´m an argentinian woman, huge fan of rugby. I know most of Pumas aren´t amateurs, but in my country all the money is for football. Here the budget for Los Pumas is 2.5 millon dollars, and french team has 102 millons (75.5 millons euros). Los Pumas has almost no support from the goverment, they have the spirit and the love of the fans that follow them when they win and when they loose.
We love the like no other.
VAMOS PUMAS CARAJO!!!
PS: Sorry for my english...

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 4:21 am
When people say that Argentina is amateur they don't mean that Argentinian players are actually amateurs, but Argentina's Rugby League is. Meaning that players here don't earn a single penny out of playing rugby. Plus, such League doesn't even EXIST: as you can see on Argentina's jersey, the "league", "union" or "association" (as you want to call it) is "URBA" which stands for Unión de Rugby de Buenos Aires, which is a province. For example, you'd see on Australia's jersey the letters for New South Wales, or London in England's.
So yeah, Argentinians may play in Europe and may be payed large amounts of money, but they will never ever lose that amateur spirit that makes them play just for the sake of it. An Argentinian called to play for Pumas accepts not for the money, not even for fame, but just for representing all the ideals that Pumas stands for.

EPIC WIN!

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 5:25 am
Mind URBA's and UAR's explanation. There is an Argentinian Rugby League and it's called UAR, as Pumas' jersey shows. My friend can get a little idiot every now and then...

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 6:01 am
UAR: It's the national team, Union Argentina de rugby. And URBA: It's the national tournament, and also it's the buenos aires teams, and means Union de Rugby de Buenos Aires, both are an organizations and both are really poor.

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 9:04 am
Je critique Laporte et le staff oui. Je ne le cache pas. Et ca fait des années que je le critique.

Je trouve hallucinnat est rabaissant pour les joueurs de dire qu'on va construire un équipe pour battres les Pumas.

Quand ja parle des joueurs manquant ou pas à leur poste, je fais plus qu'un critique sur le choix des joueurs : je critique la politique de Laporte qui consiste à ne pas nous faire jouer sur nos points forts.

Mais jereste premier supporter (tous les français le sont) de cette équipe bien evidemment.

Par contre je trouve ca encore lamentable de rabaisser la performance des argentins comme l'a fati Maso: " ils n'ont tien proposé"

Ok! Donc on a proposé moins que rien?

By K, at September 10, 2007 10:35 am
None of you have it right...
UAR is the national union (got that right)

URBA is the Buenos Aires metropolitan area Union (it's roughly akin to a Territorial Union, like a Canterbury, Gauteng, ACT).

While it is NOT THE ONLY Territory in the country, it is clearly the Territory with the best overall level.

Porteños all think the world ends at General Paz Avenue -- kinda like the same self-absorption which New Yorkers suffer from.

¿¿¿ever heard of Córdoba, Cuyo, or Tucumán??? I think more than "a few" Pumas have come from there!

By Anonymous, at September 10, 2007 2:04 pm
Hey french guys (I am french too), there are some french forum everywhere on the web where you can leave your french comments with french attitude (I mean barking at coaches and staff)
I was in the stadium and god I felt really bad about our team... we did f*cking bad against Argentinians who knew exactly how to play against us... I don't blame anybody... with all that pressure on the shoulders I can imagine that it's hard to play at your best level... Argentinians were the outsiders and French were playing at home in the garden. They turned the audience cheers into pressure and stress instead of turning them into strength.

By Marc-Olivier Meunier, at September 10, 2007 3:06 pm
i am argentinian.. i play in a small club in rosario.. it is called duendes rugby club.. in my opinion french people did not understand how a team, which is not a big nation, can won them in a world cup. Argentina show that is a dificult team in any flield.. in england france..
it is time to say the true and say that argentina could play in any tournament

By Anonymous, at September 13, 2007 3:24 am
I think Argentina won the match fairly, they simply did what they had to do tactically and backed that up with guts.
Of course Pumas are not amateur (only 2 players of the 30 in the squad), but all of them at some time played amateur here in Argentina, and that spirit still remains. I am pretty sure that none of the players in the squad thinks about money or injuries when they are on the pitch, and that´s a strength, as far as I am concerned. It´s a perfect blend between professional training and amateur spirit.

By Anonymous, at September 13, 2007 6:14 pm
Most of Pumas are not amateur, but got for sure, that no one of them start the carrier thinking in be a professional. Rugby in Argentina is amateur and will be for long years more, because our economy forbide it to became professional. And in this world cup team there are 6 amateur player, Agulla,F.Miranda and Senillosa (Hindu club) Manuel Contempomi (newman) Vernet Basualdo (Alumni) and Serra Miras (Sic).I don´t think that any player of principal teams is amateur.
PS. Sorry my english

By Anonymous, at September 26, 2007 4:57 pm
Alright, just to contribute my thoughts: the Pumas are playing an incredible campaign that's shocking the IRB's Old Guard. Clearly we have been growing since the mid 90's with players from our local leagues going off to play in Europe (you could say Noriega was the exception, but he ended up playing for the Wallabies!), but the fact remains that for many decades we were the butt of the Tier One nations.

Sadly what a previous comment mentioned is the awful truth: our recessive economy isn't allowing for a lot of athletic investment outside football that is. Starting a professional league would be fraught with salary caps and other things that would definitely kill the amateur spirit that makes the Pumas tick. If you'd ask any of the guys playing on the Pumas if they would have switched teams back when they started, the typical response would be something along the lines of 'over my dead body'. And that is priceless.

So basically, the Pumas should be incorporated into an international tournament at some point during the next few years, but the problem persists in the infrastructure: yes, the current team is excellent (probably the best ever), but once those players retire where do we look to? The local leagues? They'll still be amateur and the process to professionalism is arduous and painstakingly long.

With that being said, I can only finish with a 'VAMOS PUMAS CARAJO!!!!' And just let Scotland know this: get ready, we're coming.

By Anonymous, at October 02, 2007 1:19 pm
This is a demonstration that the pumas are a great team beating ireland and qulifying first in the death group. Poor french now agains the balck wall...

By Anonymous, at October 04, 2007 1:47 am
This world cup is not a surprise for the world of rugby, it just put in the spotlight something that has been happening in the last 10 years: The Pumas beating constantly the northern hemisphere countries (just for you to know Argentina won 6 of the last 7 games to france - 5 of them played in france) in their house and the 6-nation teams doesn’t having any chance of beating them at home. In the bottom line I suspect that the 6-nations (specially the French that have been very vocal about it) are insecure of exposing themselves to being defeated again and again by the pumas. Do you really think that Italy deserves to be in the tournament more than argentina? They only have 20% of italian players.
French, have some honor and accept that the players were the biggest cause of your looses. Players without heart and afraid of responsibility… playing with your national jersey should be a matter of proud and motivation and not of panic

By Anonymous, at October 23, 2007 9:59 am
So argentina scored the first and last try of this rwc
cool!

By Anonymous, at November 18, 2007 2:25 pm
Hi guys, I`m from Argentina and I read several comments about that argentine rugby is not really amateur.... Although Most of the Pumas members play in France or Europe, they travel to Europe and start palying at a professional level once they arrive there, arround 23 years old. Before going to Europe players in Argentina have another compromises, for example family, studies, jobs and after that rugby because in this country its imposible to live of this sport because they don`t pay you for playing, so sorry but you are wrong. If france lost the first place in the zone and the game for the tihrd and fourth place i`m sorry bad luck you will have to try harder next time

By Anonymous, at December 27, 2007 4:20 pm
Excellent try from this fullback, but please, Corleto is only with one "t" because with two it's italian, not argentinian !

Go fullbacks !!!

By Anonymous, at March 02, 2008 2:24 pm
There was too many up and unders in the world cup - alright, if they work they are fine, but i hardly see one work anyway.

By Anonymous, at April 02, 2008 3:42 pm
Marvelous try by Corletto!

By Anonymous, at June 22, 2008 12:53 pm