Scotland vs Argentina - 16/11/25

[argie]

The entry of Santiago Carreras changed the game in our favor. The player of the Match in My opinión.

 

[OllyM97]

I've turned it off. Scotland aren't even playing brilliantly and they're still cruising this. Absolutely boring game.

. OMG. Santi Carreras you beauty. A Scottish capitulation never gets old.

 

[argie]

View attachment 25050

Oops.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Carreras impact was undeniable, but Matera's was up there, too. And we needed both to turn this around.

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Everyone in here hating on Scotland should really remember to enjoy the moment.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Oh boy, this opens so many doors to roasting opportunities. Not sure where to begin.

 

[Rogie]

what a performance from argentina and carreres from bath. not in the game 1st half but 12 hcap at halftime proved way to much

 

[BMatt]

Everyone in here hating on Scotland should really remember to enjoy the moment.

Years of anyone but England have an effect.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

 

[ChicagoKid]

View attachment 25051

Vamos Los Pumas!!!

 

[higgik]

Said last week, when Bath click their back line will be awesome.
Spencer, Russell, Ojomoh/Redpath, Lawrence, Cocka, Arundel, Carreras.

 

[Welsh Exile]

Haven’t seen the game. Is it worth watching?

 

[Saintjay]

Haven't seen the game. Is it worth watching?

Just watch the second half if in a rush.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

What's wrong with people? Tons, TONS of phrases along the lines of "Scotland collapsed" or "the bench changed everything". Well, NO, and no ****, Sherlock.
It shouldn't take a neurosurgeon nor a ESA engineer to have a look at the initial line up and realize that Arg not only had many players unavailable but also benched several others who are mostly starters. Add a YC at min 5 and sure, we'll naturally we will probably struggle a bit in the first half. I mean, look at out defense on the first half and missed tackles. Who, WHO on earth could have predicted a downgrade on our defense when 2 out of our 3 best defensive tacklers (Kremer and Matera) weren't playing.

Then 2H starts, nothing really changes in the first 5 min and then, within 10 mins, Arg goes all in with the subs and a Scottish player gets YC. And that happened while facing a team going for broke.
Sure, Matera and Carreras had a very good game, credit where credit is due. But they were both a substantial upgrade in terms of substitutions.
We made 8 changes. Scotland made 5. Why? God knows. How many kicks did we miss? i recall 3 at least.

I'm not saying the end result was predictable. What I am saying is that, given the lineups, yellow cards, and substitutions, the overall direction of both halves wasn't that hard to anticipate. Some people (not everyone, but…) are misreading this; Scotland capitulated, etc. Ridiculous.
A full strength Arg is better than the best team Scotland can field today. Our 1H team clearly wasn't (better than Scotland) and our 2H team was enough to beat them. I guess Townsend could have played a bit with more with the subs, but some sort of decent comeback attempt was nothing short of inevitable.

 

[Horacito]

What's wrong with people? Tons, TONS of phrases along the lines of "Scotland collapsed" or "the bench changed everything". Well, NO, and no ****, Sherlock.
It shouldn't take a neurosurgeon nor a ESA engineer to have a look at the initial line up and realize that Arg not only had many players unavailable but also benched several others who are mostly starters. Add a YC at min 5 and sure, we'll naturally we will probably struggle a bit in the first half. I mean, look at out defense on the first half and missed tackles. Who, WHO on earth could have predicted a downgrade on our defense when 2 out of our 3 best defensive tacklers (Kremer and Matera) weren't playing.

Then 2H starts, nothing really changes in the first 5 min and then, within 10 mins, Arg goes all in with the subs and a Scottish player gets YC. And that happened while facing a team going for broke.
Sure, Matera and Carreras had a very good game, credit where credit is due. But they were both a substantial upgrade in terms of substitutions.
We made 8 changes. Scotland made 5. Why? God knows. How many kicks did we miss? i recall 3 at least.

I'm not saying the end result was predictable. What I am saying is that, given the lineups, yellow cards, and substitutions, the overall direction of both halves wasn't that hard to anticipate. Some people (not everyone, but…) are misreading this; Scotland capitulated, etc. Ridiculous.
A full strength Arg is better than the best team Scotland can field today. Our 1H team clearly wasn't (better than Scotland) and our 2H team was enough to beat them. I guess Townsend could have played a bit with more with the subs, but some sort of decent comeback attempt was nothing short of inevitable.

certainly, the coaching today was something to relish, contepomi proving the doubters wrong after a so-so RC

argentina's bomb squad right there

 

[Five Meters Out]

Love those Argies. Hot and cold, but always capable of a win over any team these days.

 

[OllyM97]

Love those Argies. Hot and cold, but always capable of a win over any team these days.

I’m not an Argentina supporter, but I guess from their perspective it’s probably better to be inconsistent but capable of beating every team in the World, rather than routinely beating Wales, Scotland, Italy etc but always losing easily to the top 3/4 sides. I have to say I do have a massive soft spot for the Pumas - I always make an effort to watch all their games because they’re so entertaining and you really don’t know what you’re going to get.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

No doubt Scotland will still turn up for England though. It's interesting how massively out of whack their win % against England is compared to everyone else (and vice versa our loss rate to them compared to everyone else).

 

[BPM]

Well England will need to be on their game next weekend. The high of a rare win over the All Blacks will be significantly dampened if we don't back it up against Argentina. Their tails will be up and they'll fancy a clean sweep of the Home Nations, but our record against them is very good.

What's wrong with people? Tons, TONS of phrases along the lines of "Scotland collapsed" or "the bench changed everything". Well, NO, and no ****, Sherlock.
It shouldn't take a neurosurgeon nor a ESA engineer to have a look at the initial line up and realize that Arg not only had many players unavailable but also benched several others who are mostly starters. Add a YC at min 5 and sure, we'll naturally we will probably struggle a bit in the first half. I mean, look at out defense on the first half and missed tackles. Who, WHO on earth could have predicted a downgrade on our defense when 2 out of our 3 best defensive tacklers (Kremer and Matera) weren't playing.

Then 2H starts, nothing really changes in the first 5 min and then, within 10 mins, Arg goes all in with the subs and a Scottish player gets YC. And that happened while facing a team going for broke.
Sure, Matera and Carreras had a very good game, credit where credit is due. But they were both a substantial upgrade in terms of substitutions.
We made 8 changes. Scotland made 5. Why? God knows. How many kicks did we miss? i recall 3 at least.

I'm not saying the end result was predictable. What I am saying is that, given the lineups, yellow cards, and substitutions, the overall direction of both halves wasn't that hard to anticipate. Some people (not everyone, but…) are misreading this; Scotland capitulated, etc. Ridiculous.
A full strength Arg is better than the best team Scotland can field today. Our 1H team clearly wasn't (better than Scotland) and our 2H team was enough to beat them. I guess Townsend could have played a bit with more with the subs, but some sort of decent comeback attempt was nothing short of inevitable.

The thing is, you taking an angry and completely polar opposite view just makes this a black and white argument. It's not. I think the reality is kind of both … Argentina radically improved in the second half AND Scotland imploded.

This game actually reminded me of England last Autumn. Put ourselves in a winning position, only to collapse in the second half.

 

[NotTooAmused]

No doubt Scotland will still turn up for England though. It's interesting how massively out of whack their win % against England is compared to everyone else (and vice versa our loss rate to them compared to everyone else).

We won't be able to deal with the box kicks. England will win.

 

[Half Pint]

Compare game management of the Scotland fly half this weekend ("the best 10 in the world", in Scotland) , with the game management of the England fly half.

Also kudos to the Pumas. They really can beat *anyone*.
People might say that of Scotland as well, but by "anyone" they usually mean "England".

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

People might say that of Scotland as well, but by "anyone" they usually mean "England".

Find me an Irish fan who says that and you can have my next month's salary!

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Weird question: how safe would it be to walk around in downtown Edinburgh with an Arg jersey? I'd feel rather safe in Dublin, Cardiff and London, but i've never done so in Scotland.

The thing is, you taking an angry and completely polar opposite view just makes this a black and white argument. It's not. I think the reality is kind of both … Argentina radically improved in the second half AND Scotland imploded.

Not sure i am doing that. I was looking at the facts and trying to to see if the conclusion resonates with those facts. Maybe i wasnt clear. Let me try to rephase it:

Say we have 3 tiers of players. We started several 3rd tier (our FH comes to mind), benched several 1st tier (Matera, Carreras, etc) and got a YC at minute 5. Scotland fielded their best from minute 0. Those are facts. So yes, we were on our back foot for most of the 1H and our defense wasnt up to the task. We could argue whether or not we could have done better or not with those resources (Contepomi's face suggested he was not happy!), but i sincerely think it's reasonable for us to assume that the momentum would change once we both teams used their benches. Ours would be an upside and Scotland a downside.
I am willing to concede that the extent of the comeback was probably bigger than what I expected, but i wouldnt say Scotland capitulated. They just downgraded their players with their subs. Add fatigue (we made 8 changes to Scotland's 5) and a YC and you've got something. And regarding the point difference, it was big sure. But we missed how many kicks (that we generally wouldn't)?

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Also kudos to the Pumas. They really can beat *anyone*.
People might say that of Scotland as well, but by "anyone" they usually mean "England".

Styles make fights, and England's style tends to counter us quite effectively. Not saying this with a smile on my face, believe me. And it's not just how good/bad they/we were/are at the moment.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Weird question: how safe would it be to walk around in downtown Edinburgh with an Arg jersey? I'd feel rather safe in Dublin, Cardiff and London, but i've never done so in Scotland.

Very
There really isn't any level of animosity, to that level, in rugby fandom - the worst you could wear is an England jersey but even then: completely safe, at worst you might get the stink eye

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Didn’t see the game, but that’s shocking from Scotland.

Townsend’s Scotland feel like they’re missing the top 2 inches. Perennially flatter to deceive and you’ve got to think he’s taken them as far as he can.

He’s 4/5 v Aus, 0/4 v Boks and 0/3 v ABs.

Hasn’t got out of the group in 2 RWCs although 23 was a group of death.

6N record: 2x3rd, 5x4th and 1x5th.

 

[Quel Carreleur]

Didn't see the game, but that's shocking from Scotland.

Townsend's Scotland feel like they're missing the top 2 inches. Perennially flatter to deceive and you've got to think he's taken them as far as he can.

He's 4/5 v Aus, 0/4 v Boks and 0/3 v ABs.

Hasn't got out of the group in 2 RWCs although 23 was a group of death.

6N record: 2x3rd, 5x4th and 1x5th.

What are the equivalent stats for Scotland this century?

 

[dirty harry]

Didn't see the game, but that's shocking from Scotland.

Townsend's Scotland feel like they're missing the top 2 inches. Perennially flatter to deceive and you've got to think he's taken them as far as he can.

He's 4/5 v Aus, 0/4 v Boks and 0/3 v ABs.

Hasn't got out of the group in 2 RWCs although 23 was a group of death.

6N record: 2x3rd, 5x4th and 1x5th.

To be fair im willing to bet those stats are much better than the decade before townsend.

Teams like Scotland have a ceiling, only 2 clubs, small player pool, limited finances and culture lends itself to football over rugby. How do they realistically compete with powerhouses like England and France?

Theyve done well to recruit, and find top talent from around the world to supllement the squad, similar to Ireland.

They probably should have competed for 6N title by now, i know they won 5N in 99, which was a RWC year and experimental squads, but i honestly think Townsend isnt the problem, its player quality.

Wales are in the beginings of a 25 year period that will hopefully be on par with Scotlands 2000s, and have all the same problems, especially if they follow the 2 club strategy and decide they are minnows.

Scotland should progress from the groups next RWC, 2nd tier, expanded tournament, and then re adress on their future post Townsend, but i really have respect for him, I think hes a top quality coach!

 

[dirty harry]

FTR

I dont think Contepomi gets as much credit as he deserves, he consistently problem solved mid game and finds ways to win, especially when things arent going well.

I think had he sat there cool as a cucumber yesterday, all the plaudits would be on him as opposed to Carreras, but because he wears his heart on his sleeve, head in hands, punches walls etc he isnt considered a mastermind, which i think he is!

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

What are the equivalent stats for Scotland this century?

Finished 4th in the 2 6N pre Townsend although the record was lamentable before that.

Qualified for QFs in 3 of the 4 RWCs.

Beat the Boks and Aus twice each.

I’m not expecting them to be consistent world beaters, but it does feel to me that Townsend’s taken them as far as he can. 8 years is a long time with the same voice and the absence of many discernable highs - unless beating England is all that matters.