Saturday 1 December 2018

Barbarians edge 73-point thriller

A late drop-goal from Elton Jantjies saw the Barbarians complete an epic 38-35 come-from-behind victory over Argentina in their Killik Cup game.

Despite trailing 28-7 at one point in the first-half, the Baa-baas came out on top at Twickenham thanks to Jantjies' effort from 35 metres.

The Barbarians' try scorers were Juan Manuel Leguizamon, Siya Kolisi, Damian de Allende and Lood de Jager, with a penalty try also awarded by referee John Lacey to go with extra points from Handre Pollard and Jantjies.

In reply for Argentina, Matias Orlando, Ramiro Moyano, Pablo Matera, Sebastian Cancelliere and Julian Montoya crossed the whitewash, with Joaquin Diaz Bonilla sending over 10 points with his boot from the tee.

It was a thoroughly entertaining first-half at Twickenham as 42 points were scored, with Argentina going into the dressing rooms 28-14 up.

The Barbarians in fact took the lead inside two minutes with Kolisi and Schalk Brits combining well before Leguizamon barged over for 7-0.

The early score woke up the Pumas though and two minutes after Cancelliere went close on both wings, Orlando dived over on the right after Baa-baas fly-half Pollard took the strange option of a chip close to his own line.  Bonilla converted that try to level things up in the match.

Bonilla then turned provider when his grubber kick through was easily gathered by Moyano to make it 14-7 and when Moyano offloaded to Orlando, who in turn found Matera in support for their third, the Argentines were cruising at 21-7 ahead as the Barbarians were all at sea.

Five minutes later Argentina moved even further clear with that man Moyano again involved, kicking across to Cancelliere for the try.  But fortunately for the Baa-baas they would cancel that out before the interval as they were awarded a penalty try for a maul being collapsed.

The first score of the second 40 was always going to be crucial and the Barbarians came out hungry but were halted by spirited defence.  Argentina could not stop the driving maul however as Kolisi would cross on 48 minutes for a converted try that brought the scores to 28-21.

The response was positive from Argentina and their fifth try wasn't long in coming, Montoya barging over from the back of a maul for 35-21.

De Allende was next to cross for the Baa-baas as he gobbled up Jantjies' grubber through to bring the match back to a seven-point contest.

The scoring then dried up before man-of-the-match De Jager galloped over on 75 minutes.  And then it was down to Jantjies as after adding the extras, he sat back in the pocket with two minutes to play to land the match-winning drop-goal, bringing an end to a thrilling clash.

The scorers:

For Barbarians:
Tries:  Leguizamon, Penalty try, Kolisi, De Allende, De Jager
Cons:  Pollard 2, Jantjies 2
Drop-goal:  Jantjies

For Argentina:
Tries:  Orlando, Moyano, Matera, Cancelliere, Montoya
Cons:  Bonilla 5

Barbarians:  15 Jack Debreczeni, 14 Tommaso Benvenuti, 13 Tom English, 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Aphiwe Dyantyi, 10 Handre Pollard, 9 Leon Fukofuka, 8 Juan Manuel Leguizamon, 7 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 6 Siya Kolisi, 5 Lood de Jager, 4 Luke Jones, 3 Trevor Nyakane, 2 Schalk Brits, 1 Wyatt Crockett (c)
Replacements:  16 Malcolm Marx, 17 Steven Kitshoff, 18 Anton Peikrishvili, 19 Sikhumbuzo Notshe, 20 Jordan Taufua, 21 Frank Lomani, 22 Jesse Kriel, 23 Elton Jantjies

Argentina:  15 Juan Cruz Mallia, 14 Sebastian Cancelliere, 13 Matias Orlando, 12 Bautista Ezcurra, 11 Ramiro Moyano, 10 Joaquin Diaz Bonilla, 9 Martin Landajo, 8 Rodrigo Bruni, 7 Tomas Lezana, 6 Pablo Matera (c), 5 Matias Alemanno, 4 Guido Petti, 3 Santiago Medrano, 2 Julian Montoya, 1 Juan Pablo Zeiss
Replacements:  16 Agustin Creevy, 17 Mayco Vivas, 18 Lucio Sordoni, 19 Tomas Lavanini, 20 Santiago Grondona, 21 Tomas Cubelli, 22 Jeronimo de la Fuente, 23 Santiago Carreras

Referee:  John Lacey (Ireland)
Assistant referees:  Andrew Brace (Ireland), Ben Whitehouse (Wales)
TMO:  Andrew McMenemy (Scotland)