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Daniel Hourcade’s Argentina are training with a giant pack to face England. The teams are set to lock horns on Saturday in London. Today marked the first training session in England and El Huevo fielded a lineup with several talking points.
In the front-row there were no surprises. Captain Agustín Creevy was joined by Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro and Lucas Noguera Paz. Both Felipe Arregui and Santiago García Botta were given time to train as the replacement props.
In the engine room Tomás Lavanini returned to the starting formation, doing so in partnership with Matías Alemanno. This marks a bulked-up second row and one in which Argentina has less pace but greater power.
The bulky second-row combination was further enforced by the back-row. 20-year-old Marcos Kremer is a natural lock though he has played flanker previously for Argentina at u20 level. Today he trained at flanker for the first time for Los Pumas.
Kremer and Pablo Matera were the starting flankers today. In another piece of enterprise Hourcade had Tomás Lezana training as the run-on No 8. It is a position in which he has played in under Hourcade this year though he has four specialist’s in the position on the roster.
Missing from the starting line-up was Guido Petti. Despite being among the leading Pumas in 2017 he is lighter than Lavanini, Alemanno and Kremer. Petti weighs 109 kg or 240 lbs. Lavanini is 130 kg or 285 lbs while Alemanno and Kremer both weigh-in at 115 kg or 255 lbs.
In the back-line Martín Landajo trained as the starting scrum-half. He partnered veteran Juan Martín Hernández. Regular Nicolás Sánchez was out of the picture today.
In the mid-field regular starter Jerónimo de La Fuente is set to miss the match though a minor injury. In his absence Hourcade used Santiago González Iglesias as the starting inside center. Rete was partnered not by Matías Orlando but, rather, by Matías Moroni.
Completing the line-up in the back-three were Joaquín Tuculet, Ramiro Moyano and Emiliano Boffelli. Moyano missed the late rounds of the Rugby Championship with a broken hand but is set to be declared fully fit and will start against England.
ARGENTINA (in training)
15 Joaquín Tuculet, 14 Ramiro Moyano, 13 Matías Moroni, 12 Santiago González Iglesias, 11 Emiliano Boffelli, 10 Juan Martín Hernández, 9 Martín Landajo, 8 Tomás Lezana, 7 Pablo Matera, 6 Marcos Kremer, 5 Tomás Lavanini, 4 Matías Alemanno, 3 Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro, 2 Agustín Creevy (Capt.), 1 Lucas Noguera Paz
