Argentina

A 1910 defeat and the wrong cat

Argentina played their first international in 1910 and lost it, to a touring side from the British Isles. The nickname came 55 years later and by mistake: on the 1965 tour of southern Africa a journalist took the animal on the shirt for a puma when it was in fact a jaguar, and Los Pumas has been the name ever since.

For most of the amateur period Argentina played too few tests to compound anything they learned. The breakthrough was 2007, when they reached a World Cup semi-final for the first time and finished third; they were fourth again in 2015. Admission to the Rugby Championship in 2012 handed them an annual diet of South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, where their best finish has been runners-up in 2020.

Home tests are deliberately spread around the country rather than parked in the capital. José Amalfitani in Buenos Aires remains the default, but Córdoba, San Juan, Santiago del Estero, San Salvador de Jujuy and Mendoza all staged internationals in 2026 alone.

The results that changed how they are measured

Two performances in 2025 reset expectations. In June, in Dublin, Argentina beat the British and Irish Lions for the first time, 28-24 at the Aviva Stadium, with Tomás Albornoz controlling the game at fly-half. Two months later, on 23 August 2025, they beat New Zealand 29-23 at Amalfitani, a week after losing to the same side 41-24 in Córdoba.

The rest of that Rugby Championship exposed the pattern that still defines them. Argentina finished fourth of four on ten points with two wins from six, conceding 214 points, and their last act was a 29-27 defeat by South Africa at Twickenham on 4 October 2025 — close enough to count as evidence, lost all the same.

The squad that produces those days is built around forwards with long European careers: captain Julián Montoya, now at Pau and past 120 caps, and Pablo Matera, Argentina's most-capped player at 127, still starting at 33.

Year one of the Nations Championship

There was no Rugby Championship in 2026. In its place came the Nations Championship, a twelve-team competition run jointly by Six Nations and SANZAAR: the six European sides, the four Rugby Championship nations, plus Fiji and Japan, split into northern and southern sections. Three rounds are played in July, three more in Europe in November, and the whole field converges on Allianz Stadium, Twickenham for a finals weekend from 27 to 29 November, where the two group winners meet in the final and the rest play ranked north-versus-south placement matches. It is scheduled biennially, in years without a World Cup or a Lions tour.

Argentina's July leg was played at home and went 1-2. Scotland won 47-38 at the Estadio Mario Alberto Kempes in Córdoba on 4 July, Argentina beat Wales 35-21 at the Estadio Bicentenario in San Juan on 11 July, and England won 31-24 in Santiago del Estero on 18 July.

The England match ended in dispute. Bautista Delguy appeared to score what would have made it 31-29 in the final seconds; after a review by TMO Brett Cronan, referee Angus Gardner ruled the arm had gone into touch under Henry Slade's intervention and the try was struck off. England had led 19-3 at the break through two Ben Earl tries and one from Tommy Freeman, with Mateo Carreras and Justo Piccardo scoring Argentina's second-half tries. The July table left South Africa and New Zealand unbeaten on 15 points, Australia on 8 and Argentina fourth on 7.

August and September: a reserve squad, then a home series lost

The August window fell outside the Nations Championship and outside the European club release period, so Argentina met South Africa at Amalfitani on 8 August with ten players uncapped and without Montoya, Marcos Kremer and Albornoz among others. South Africa won 17-10, scoring through Edwill van der Merwe and Cameron Hanekom, with Benjamín Grondona's converted try and a Santiago Carreras penalty the whole of Argentina's return. Before the game, Rodrigo Isgró said two weeks of preparation was a luxury and that the new players needed help getting up to speed.

Australia then came for two tests and took the series, the first they have won in Argentina. The Wallabies won the opener 27-21 in San Salvador de Jujuy. On 5 September, in front of 28,000 in Mendoza, Argentina came from 14-0 down to lead 28-21 through Matera's second try, having already scored through Ignacio Mendy and Ignacio Ruiz with Carreras converting all four. Yellow cards to Lucio Cinti and then Carreras reduced them to 13, and Carreras's deliberate knock-on brought a penalty try that made it 28-28 with ten minutes left. Australia could not finish it off against a side two players short, and the match ended level.

Edwards, Ledesma and the thirty-five days

On 9 October the Argentine Rugby Union announced two appointments to Felipe Contepomi's staff, both contracted to the end of the 2027 World Cup. Shaun Edwards, 59, who left the France set-up in June after seven years as defence coach, takes the same role; Mario Ledesma, head coach from 2018 to 2022, returns to run the forwards and the scrum. Edwards said he would start at the end of the month and hoped to bring some international experience to the group. Contepomi said both men know what competing at the highest level requires.

The timing is the point. A squad of 33 assembled in London from 26 to 28 October for a three-day camp — by La Nación's count on 18 October, the first time all year the full group had been in one place, opening a 35-day block of work with the World Cup a year away. Santiago Carreras, of Bath, and Thomas Gallo, of Lyon, were withdrawn injured on the eve of it and replaced by Mateo Soler and Rodrigo Martínez; Santiago Chocobares was waiting on head-injury clearance with Matías Moroni on standby.

That same assessment is blunt about where the team is thin. Contepomi has used 65 players across 31 matches in two and a half years. Prop has been the problem position for fifteen years, Gonzalo García is the only scrum-half of clear international standard, and Albornoz has no settled understudy after Carreras struggled at fly-half in the tests against South Africa and Australia. Second row and back row are the opposite case: Pedro Rubiolo, Guido Petti, Franco Molina and a returning Tomás Lavanini behind Matera, Kremer and Joaquín Moro.

Where they stand, and what November has to produce

World Rugby had Argentina eighth on 82.24 points as of September 2026, a ranking that reflects results rather than performances — a draw and five defeats in six tests since the Wales win, several of them decided inside the last ten minutes.

The November leg is four matches, all away, all on sale: Ireland at the Aviva Stadium on 6 November, Italy at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris in Genoa on 14 November, France at the Stade de France on 21 November, then a Nations Championship finals-weekend fixture at Twickenham between 27 and 29 November, listed against England. Reaching the final itself would require South Africa and New Zealand, both unbeaten, to collapse; the realistic target is the placement ladder and a better sample of evidence than the southern-hemisphere leg produced. World Rugby named the referees for the window on 22 October.

Coverage is free-to-air in much of Europe — ITV in the United Kingdom, Virgin Media in Ireland, TF1 in France — with ESPN and Disney+ Premium carrying the matches in Argentina.