Lions must learn from errors in Pumas loss
Head coach Andy Farrell says the British and Irish Lions must learn "a lot of lessons" from a "disconnected" performance in Friday's 28-24 loss to Argentina in Dublin as they prepare to embark on their Australian tour. The Lions' hopes for victory in their first game on Irish soil were dashed by a slick Pumas side, who scored breakaway tries through Ignacio Mendy, Tomas Albornoz and Santiago Cordero to secure a deserved first win over the hosts at the eighth attempt. Farrell's side travel on Saturday and must regroup in time for their tour opener against Western Force in Perth on 28 June. "We made it a tough game," said Farrell, who was taking charge of his first Lions game."The first and appropriate thing to say is congratulations to Argentina, they thoroughly deserved to win. They capitalised very well on quite a few errors from us, so congratulations and I'm sure that's a big moment in Argentina's history."
Bundee Aki and Tadhg Beirne scored tries for the Lions, who were also awarded a penalty try early in the second half, but it was not enough to beat the world's fifth-ranked team. "You can try and throw it all around and say we had plenty of opportunities and we should have done better, but the story of the game is we compounded too many errors and weren't able to put the pace on the game that we wanted to because of that," added Farrell.The Lions travelled to Portugal for a week-long training camp before facing Argentina, but when asked if the squad has not had enough time together, Farrell said he "wouldn't give that excuse". "We need to be better than that. It is what it is," he added."The Lions players are good players coming together. We ask a lot of them and maybe we put too much pressure on the side because it certainly looked like we were a bit disconnected at times. "We'll review what we said we were going to own and we need to make sure we get something positive from that because it's all about how we move forward."
'Some players will be happy, others won't'
Given that Farrell was without the sizeable portion of his squad who contested domestic finals last weekend - Ronan Kelleher being the sole exception - Friday's game against the Pumas was a chance for some to stake an early claim for Test selection. And when asked what positives he could draw from the defeat, Farrell said "some people will have done themselves proud" without singling out any players."They'll be hurting for the team because they're all team players," he added."Some players will be happy, others won't and will be dying to get another chance, but look we know where we're at, we're under way so we need to learn a lot of lessons from that."
The Lions fielded 14 debutants on Friday and a new captain in Maro Itoje, who described his first outing as skipper as a "spectacular occasion" before echoing Farrell's downbeat comments about the performance. "We gave ourselves numerous opportunities but we weren't accurate enough at times and weren't consistent enough in putting pressure under Argentina," said Itoje. "As we improve our relationships and spend more time together in training and understanding each other's triggers, it'll come. "There are no excuses. We should have been better today but as with other areas of the game, we'll learn and get better together."
Line-ups
British and Irish Lions: Marcus Smith; Tommy Freeman, Sione Tuipulotu, Bundee Aki, Duhan van der Merwe; Fin Smith, Alex Mitchell; Ellis Genge, Luke Cowan-Dickie, Finlay Bealham, Maro Itoje (capt), Tadhg Beirne, Tom Curry, Jac Morgan, Ben Earl.Replacements: Ronan Kelleher, Pierre Schoeman, Tadhg Furlong, Scott Cummings, Henry Pollock, Tomos Williams, Elliot Daly, Mack Hansen.Argentina: Santiago Carreras; Rodrigo Isgro, Lucio Cinti, Justo Piccardo, Ignacio Mendy; Tomas Albornoz, Gonzalo Garcia; Mayco Vivas, Julian Montoya (capt), Joel Sclavi, Franco Molina, Pedro Rubiolo, Pablo Matera, Juan Martin Gonzalez, Joaquin OviedoReplacements: Bautista Bernasconi, Boris Wenger, Francisco Coria Marchetti, Santiago Grondona, Joaquin Moro, Simon Benitez Cruz, Matias Moroni, Santiago CorderoSin-bin: Vivas 45Referee: James Doleman (New Zealand)Assistant referees: Nika Amashukeli (Georgia) and Andrea Piardi (Italy)TMO: Eric Gauzins (France)
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