Why rugby must learn to cherish outliers Argentina

The story goes that the sobriquet by which the Argentine national rugby team has become commonly known came about as a case of mistaken identity. The tale told is of a South African journalist watching a touring side in the 1960s and seeking a snappy name to assist him at second mention.

- HARRY LATHAM-COYLE

A whiskered beast on the badge of their blue and white kit provided inspiration, but the reporter in question was no feline specialist, clued up on his South American cats enough only to know that it must be either a jaguar or a puma stitched onto the Argentinians’ chest.

His punt of the Pumas was wrong but the nickname stuck. Last year, the Argentina union finally gave in, correcting their crest to the creature by which their national rugby side had long been known.

Perhaps the yarn is apocryphal but it is strangely befitting of a nation that has always occupied a curious place in rugby’s ecosystem. There is deep history of the sport in the country – the British & Irish Lions toured in 1910 – but the Pumas have always felt unloved, to some extent, by rugby’s administrators. In a territory in which the sport has no other true stronghold, they have been an oddity at a top table they belatedly joined with their elevation into the Rugby Championship in 2012.

Argentina’s men have competed at every World Cup and reached semi-finals at three of the last five tournaments, but success in the Southern Hemisphere’s premier international competition has been elusive. In their first decade after joining the Tri-Nations heavyweights, Argentina avoided the wooden spoon only twice.

But results in recent years show that something special may be stirring. In November of 2020, the All Blacks were conquered for the first time; two years later, a first win was secured on New Zealand soil and England were beaten at Twickenham. This year’s Rugby Championship has brought another significant step forward: victory over the Springboks in a raucous Santiago del Estero meant that the Pumas had conquered each of the Southern Hemisphere’s big beasts in a single campaign for the first time.