Argentina hand Italy another Nations Championship defeat

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GENOA, Italy, Nov 14 : Argentina beat Italy 19-14 on Saturday in a Nations Championship meeting short on quality and high on errors which condemned the hosts to their fifth defeat in five matches in the competition.

Italy took an early lead through Monty Ioane's try, converted by Tommaso Allan, but Argentina, who were down to 14 men, levelled just before halftime, with hooker Bautista Bernasconi going over and Tomas Albornoz adding the conversion.

Rodrigo Isgro's try in the 55th minute put Argentina ahead and five minutes later Mateo Carreras extended the lead when he went over for the visitors, with Albornoz converting.

A penalty try for Italy set up a grandstand finish but Argentina held on for their 10th straight win over the Italians.

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Argentina earned their second victory of the competition and are on 11 points, third in the Southern Hemisphere standings, three points ahead of Australia, who visit Scotland on Sunday.

Italy earned a losing bonus point, their first of the competition, but will finish bottom of the Northern Hemisphere group.

Both sides came into the contest low on confidence and in need of not only victory, but a much-improved performance. Argentina lost 42-12 to Ireland a week ago, while Italy were thumped 66-7 by South Africa in Turin.

BRIGHT START

The Italian fans suffered through a dominant Springbok performance last week, especially a first half which was all one-way traffic, but this time around the hosts started brightly in Genoa with a fifth-minute try.

Leonardo Marin's kick through on the wing bounced up perfectly for Ioane to go over in the corner. That move followed an Italian penalty won at the scrum, and Argentina were penalised twice more in the first half for collapsing.

Allan missed a penalty from inside his own half, and Italy continually failed to capitalise on Argentine ill-discipline. After kicking two penalties into the corner, Italy lost their lineout close to the line.

Albornoz was sent to the sin-bin just before the half-hour mark but Argentina then had their best spell and Bernasconi's try from a lineout drive was converted by the flyhalf, back on the pitch just in time for the kick.

Argentina continued to make plenty of entries into the Italian 22 after the break, but errors let them down until they managed to hold firm in the scrum and worked the ball to the other side for Isgro to put them ahead.

Italy lost Enoch Opoku Gyamfi to a yellow card for too many penalties and Argentina pounced immediately with Carreras' try.

Argentina's Joel Sclavi was yellow carded, and Efrain Elias quickly followed suit when Italy were awarded a penalty try with 15 minutes remaining but their late pressure went unrewarded.

Gonzalo Quesada's Italy will hope to finish off in style next Saturday when they host Fiji in Udine, the only other winless side in the competition, and the pair are likely to meet on finals weekend in the 11th-place final.

Argentina travel to Paris next weekend to take on France, who top the Northern Hemisphere standings.