Argentina has unveiled its squad for the Lipovitan-D Rugby Championship opener against New Zealand, with several high-profile absentees and key players returning for the clash at Mario Alberto Kempes Stadium on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Veteran utility back Mat\u00edas Moroni, who impressed during last month\u2019s series against England, has been omitted from the matchday group. Loose forward Facundo Isa, who opted out of Argentina\u2019s 2024 international campaign, and lock Tom\u00e1s Lavanini are also missing. Scrum-half Gonzalo Bertranou, sidelined by injury during the England series, will not feature.<\/p>\n
Injury has also ruled out Benjamin Grondona, Emiliano Boffelli and Thomas Gallo, removing valuable experience from the Pumas\u2019 arsenal.<\/p>\n
On the positive side, Argentina welcomes back several seasoned campaigners who sat out the England series. Juan Cruz Mall\u00eda, Santiago Chocobares, Marcos Kremer, Bautista Delguy, Mateo Carreras and Ignacio Ruiz will make their first appearances of the season, bolstering both the backline and forward pack.<\/p>\n
The Pumas will be aiming to make history against an All Blacks side they have beaten three times \u2014 most recently in a 38-30 upset in Wellington last year \u2014 but have never defeated on home soil. The closest Argentina has come was a 21-21 draw in 1985. In their last meeting, New Zealand cruised to a 42-10 win at Eden Park.<\/p>\n
Sunday\u2019s match will be the first Test between the sides in C\u00f3rdoba, and the All Blacks\u2019 first game in the city since 2014. French referee Pierre Brousset will officiate the opener, with Australian Nic Berry set to take charge of the second Test in Buenos Aires.<\/p>\n
Argentina squad For The Rugby Championship:<\/p>\n
Forwards: Bautista Bernasconi, Francisco Coria Marchetti, Pedro Delgado, Juan Mart\u00edn Gonz\u00e1lez, Santiago Grondona, Marcos Kremer, Pablo Matera, Franco Molina, Juli\u00e1n Montoya, Joaqu\u00edn Oviedo, Lucas Paulos, Guido Petti, Pedro Rubiolo, Ignacio Ruiz, Joel Sclavi, Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro, Mayco Vivas, Boris Wenger.<\/p>\n
Backs: Thomas Bathrobe, Sim\u00f3n Ben\u00edtez Cruz, Mateo Carreras, Santiago Chocobares, Lucio Cinti, Bautista Delguy, Benjam\u00edn Elizalde, Gonzalo Garc\u00eda, Rodrigo Isgr\u00f3, Juan Cruz Mall\u00eda, Ignacio Mendy, Agust\u00edn Moyano, Justo Piccardo, Ger\u00f3nimo Prisciantelli.<\/p>\n
North American rugby fans can catch every minute of Argentina vs. New Zealand and the rest of the Rugby Championship live and exclusively on FloRugby.<\/p>\n
How To Watch Rugby Matches In The United States On FloRugby<\/p>\n
The URC will stream all its matches on FloRugby and the FloSports app in the United States. FloRugby and FloSports also are the U.S. home to:\u00a0<\/p>\n
FloRugby also is home to match archives and match replays.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Join The Rugby Conversation On FloRugby Social<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Argentina has unveiled its squad for the Lipovitan-D Rugby Championship opener against New Zealand, with several high-profile absentees…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60310,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-60309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60309\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}