{"id":694900,"date":"2026-07-16T13:49:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T13:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/694900\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T13:49:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T13:49:08","slug":"england-team-v-argentina-henry-pollock-benched-as-borthwick-rewards-fiji-thrashing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/694900\/","title":{"rendered":"England team v Argentina: Henry Pollock benched as Borthwick rewards Fiji thrashing"},"content":{"rendered":"

England<\/a> head coach Steve Borthwick has again kept Henry Pollock on the bench, opting for an unchanged starting XV to take on Los Pumas in Santiago del Estero.<\/p>\n

The Northampton Saints number eight has been in red-hot form in recent weeks, winning Man of the Match in the PREM Rugby final and scoring a hat-trick in England\u2019s 73-8 win over Fiji last time out, but Borthwick has again opted to deploy him on the bench in the impact role.<\/p>\n

But, keeping an unchanged side will ensure some level of continuity heading to South America, as England look to make it two wins on the spin after snapping their five-Test losing run at the Hill Dickinson Stadium.<\/p>\n

The visitors have also won each of the last six meetings against Los Pumas in Borthwick\u2019s tenure, including two Tests in Argentina last July.<\/p>\n

England name unchanged starting XV for Los Pumas showdown<\/p>\n

The decision to name an unchanged XV sees Marcus Smith continue at full-back amid injuries to both George Furbank and Freddie Steward. Tommy Freeman also starts on the wing again after starting five of England\u2019s<\/a> past seven Tests at outside centre, while Immanuel Feyi-Waboso completes the back-three combination.<\/p>\n

Henry Slade and Seb Atkinson again form the centre pairing, while Fin Smith and Jack van Poortvliet continue at fly-half and scrum-half, respectively.<\/p>\n

Wales team v Springboks: Six changes as Alex Mann returns to face \u2018most physical side in the world\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

Ben Earl, Guy Pepper and Ollie Chessum are again named as the back-row unit, with George Martin and Alex Coles the locks. Joe Heyes, Jamie George and Ellis Genge all retain their spots in the front-row.<\/p>\n

Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for world-class coverage you can trust.<\/p>\n

There are, however, some changes on the bench, with debutant Emmanuel Iyogun and Ben Spencer coming in alongside Luke Cowan-Dickie, Asher Opoku-Fordjour, Tom Curry, Pollock, Benhard Janse van Rensburg and Noah Caluori.<\/p>\n

Commenting on his selection, Borthwick<\/a> said: \u201cWe\u2019re excited by the challenge of playing Los Pumas in Santiago del Estero.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe expect a fantastic atmosphere with passionate home support. It promises to be a great occasion, and one the players are excited to embrace.\u201d<\/p>\n

France team v Japan: Top 14 winner among four changes as Matthieu Jalibert experiment continues<\/a><\/p>\n

England team v Argentina in full<\/p>\n

England:\u00a015 Marcus Smith, 14 Tommy Freeman, 13 Henry Slade, 12 Seb Atkinson, 11 Immanuel Feyi-Waboso, 10 Fin Smith, 9 Jack van Poortvliet, 8 Ben Earl, 7 Guy Pepper, 6 Ollie Chessum, 5 George Martin, 4 Alex Coles, 3 Joe Heyes, 2 Jamie George (c), 1 Ellis Genge
Replacements:\u00a016 Luke Cowan-Dickie, 17 Emmanuel Iyogun, 18 Asher Opoku-Fordjour, 19 Tom Curry, 20 Henry Pollock, 21 Ben Spencer, 22 Benhard Janse van Rensburg, 23 Noah Caluori<\/p>\n

Date:\u00a0Saturday, 18 July, 2026
Venue:\u00a0Estadio Unico Madre de Ciudades, Santiago del Estero
Kick-off:\u00a016:10 (local), 20:10 (UK), 21:10 (France), 21:10 (South Africa), 05:10 (19 July, AEST), 07:10 (19 July, New Zealand), 16:10 (Argentina), 04:10 (19 July, JST), 15:10 (EDT)
Referee:\u00a0Angus Gardner (RA)
Assistant Referees:\u00a0Nika Amashukeli (GRU), Paul Williams (NZR)
TMO:\u00a0Brett Cronan (RA)
FPRO:\u00a0Eric Gauzins (FFR)
Broadcasters:\u00a0ITV (United Kingdom), TF1 (France), Virgin Media Television (Republic of Ireland), Sky Italia (Italy), Wowow (Japan), Sky Sport (New Zealand), Nine Network \/ Stan Sport (Australia), SuperSport (South Africa)<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Ireland team: Andy Farrell makes wholesale changes for All Blacks showdown as Sam Prendergast returns along with British and Irish Lions<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"England head coach Steve Borthwick has again kept Henry Pollock on the bench, opting for an unchanged starting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":694901,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[14632,309,29174,348,3482,134497,50,5903,101,5831,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-694900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-argentina","tag-england","tag-henry-pollock","tag-home-page","tag-internationals","tag-nations-championship","tag-news","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-steve-borthwick","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/694901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}