England – Argentina

England will take on Argentina in the 2019 Rugby World Cup Pool C on Saturday, with the Pumas likely playing their last chance to finish in the Top 2 and qualify for the quarterfinals.

England played as you would expect from them so far, without even needing to go beyond 2nd gear in their first two games. The Red Rose was able to preserve resources due to meeting Tonga and USA, which they defeated 35-3 and 45-7 respectively. England already showed improvement from an average performance against Tonga to a very good one against USA, and they will be confident of raising the bar even higher now in their first real test of the tournament.

Argentina was solid in the last couple of years against Mario Ledesma and was very good this year in the shortened Rugby Championship, losing close games to New Zealand and Australia before getting spanked by South Africa. Unfortunately for the Pumas, they started the World Cup with a heartbreaking loss against France which almost threw them out of the competition right from the first game. Argentina played a horrible first half, came back in the second and took the lead, but a late missed penalty saw them lose 21-23. They bounced back to win 28-12 against Tonga but it was another game of two halves, and an overall below average performance.

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Team news & lineups:

After rotating the lineup 10 days ago in their previous match against USA, England will now bring the big boys in and will send their strongest starting XV on the pitch.

Argentina will obviously field the lineup they feel gives them the best chance of winning, since this is a do or die game for them. But still the Pumas shockingly left Nico Sanchez out of the squad and captain Agustin Creevy on the bench.

England: 15 Elliot Daly, 14 Anthony Watson, 13 Manu Tuilagi, 12 Owen Farrell (c), 11 Jonny May, 10 George Ford, 9 Ben Youngs, 8 Billy Vunipola, 7 Sam Underhill, 6 Tom Curry, 5 George Kruis, 4 Maro Itoje, 3 Kyle Sinckler, 2 Jamie George, 1 Joe Marler

Argentina: 15 Emiliano Boffelli, 14 Matías Moroni, 13 Matias Orlando, 12 Jeronimo de la Fuente, 11 Santiago Carreras, 10 Benjamin Urdapilleta, 9 Tomas Cubelli, 8 Javier Ortega Desio, 7 Marcos Kremer, 6 Pablo Matera (c), 5 Tomas Lavanini, 4 Guido Petti Pagadizabal, 3 Juan Figallo, 2 Julian Montoya, 1 Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro

Argentina’s lineup for this game seems peculiar with Sanchez and Creevy out. Coach Ledesma has done a great job with this team but quite honestly he looks a bit lost at the moment. His selection has been questionable ever since he left Facundo Isa out of the World Cup squad.

Ledesma is apparently favoring the domestic based players (in fact he admited it), and by leaving Sanchez and Creevy out, it looks like he`s going for broke here. This current Argentina lineup looks like the Jaguares franchise, which had a great season in Super Rugby by reaching the final, but the World Cup is a different level.

The Pumas have been a bit disappointing so far at this World Cup and will face an English side which seems to have hit top form at the right time. England is playing well, showed progress from one game to another, so another leap in performance is expected today against a stronger opponent which they can`t take lightly.

England is also a very bad matchup for Argentina. The Pumas can`t really dominate England with the scrum, which is their main weapon, so they don`t really have options to get the upper hand in a match. Everything the Pumas do, England does better. Look for England’s kicking game to create massive problems.

H2H results confirm this bad matchup for Argentina. England won the last 9 meetings. Since the 2015 World Cup, England won 4 out of 4. The Pumas even lost twice at home against an England “B” lineup.

While it`s true that England didn`t win any of these last 4 matches by more than 13 points, that`s misleading and it doesn`t mean that England didn`t completely dominate Argentina. Fact is that in one of those games England got a red card in the 5th (!!) minute, and in two of the other they played with their “B” lineup. It says a lot that the Red Rose won these games pretty handily.

My tip will be England to cover the -15,5 handicap. Prediction: England – Argentina 34 – 11.

Pick: England -15,5
Odds: 1.93 @ Sbobet
Stake: 9
Possible profit: 8.37
Event date: 5 October