Pumas come well prepared

Argentina's record in the Rugby Championship is as sorry as the country's free-falling economy.

They effectively defaulted in the corresponding fixture against the Springboks last year, but will send their best-prepared team ever into battle at Loftus tomorrow.

Los Pumas were drubbed 73-13 at Soccer City last year, but with a new coach in Daniel Hourcade and new captain Agustin Creevy, the visitors hope to consign those events to history.

They have retained six of last year's starters for tomorrow , while the Springboks have nine returnees in their ranks.

The need for Los Pumas to start a new chapter cannot be overstated. They have played 12 matches since the launch of the Rugby Championship two years ago and have yet to record a win.

They will, however, run out at Loftus with renewed vigour, having spent time in the US and Europe, and with the benefit of 10 days' training at altitude.

They will also have intimate knowledge of the local rugby landscape with Hourcade in charge until last year of the Pampas team that campaigned in the Vodacom Cup.

In fact, several players, including captain Creevy, scrumhalf Martin Landajo and ace goal kicker Nicolas Sanchez, cut their teeth in that competition.

The visitors are primed and ready to go and it would not have escaped them that several players in the home side are short of a gallop, despite the fact that the entire Bok squad have been in camp for almost two weeks.

Captain Jean de Villiers, Damian de Allende, Ruan Pienaar, Bryan Habana, Tendai Mtawarira, Bakkies Botha, Lood de Jager and Francois Louw are short of game time.

Added to that, gifted flyhalf Handre Pollard will start only his second Test and De Allende will make his debut in a position he last occupied against the Blue Bulls in the Currie Cup last year.

Argentina will target the pair, but they have De Villiers to shepherd them.

"Jean will be there and that will help," said De Allende.

"For me, it's going to be about making the right decisions at the right time, identify the space on the outside and the space behind the defenders.

"The coach wants a physical presence from me. On the day it will be quite exciting because Loftus is quite a fast pitch. Anything can happen.

"Playing the situation is probably the right thing."

If coach Heyneke Meyer was impressed with De Allende before he joined the squad, his estimation of the Capetonian has gone through the roof in training.

"In the last week, I've also been impressed with his soft touches," Meyer said.

"He runs beautiful lines and is good enough to get the ball away. Damian's got enough speed. The only question mark was his defence, but I've been impressed with it. We don't want to overuse Jean running the ball up, he can also do it. They can interchange as well."

The only remaining question for De Allende was whether he will observe Bok protocol by playing with his socks up. "I'm gonna have them up," he said.

He can only hope that there will be no need to do the same metaphorically.