Sloppy Ireland see off Argentina

Argentina’s Bautista Delguy and Emiliano Boffelli jumps for the high ball - REUTERS

DUBLIN, REUTERS: A sloppy Ireland put a poor first period behind them on Saturday to emerge 28-17 winners over Argentina in an unconvincing warm-up to next week’s meeting of the world’s top two teams when New Zealand visit Dublin. 

Ireland were fortunate to edge an error-strewn first 40 minutes by the home side and trailed early in the second period before finding some much-needed composure to pull away from the dangerous Pumas in the final quarter. 

“A lot of things we can do better out there. We have to move on but we’ll take that result. We had to dig really deep,” man-of-the-match James Ryan said in a pitchside interview. 

The home side’s day, however, was marred by the news that flanker Sean O’Brien, forced off through injury, had broken his arm.