RWC 1999 - Agustín Pichot Try vs Japan

Pichot scores vs Japan, RWC 1999

Last year was a big year for former Pumas scrumhalf and captain, Agustín Pichot. He was honored by both the IRB and global rugby fans with two distinctive awards. The IRB awarded him with the honor of inducting him into the IRB Hall of Fame while the global rugby audience voted him in as the best scrumhalf in the history of the Rugby World Cup. Since then he has gone on to play a major part in getting Argentina into The Rugby Championship and is the UAR´s representative to the IRB. He is also leading what is going to be an official bid for Argentina to host Rugby World Cup 2023.

While Pichot is best remembered well for his role in leading Argentina to the Bronze Medal in France 2007, that World Cup was his fourth and he had emerged from being largely unknown to be a star performer at Rugby World Cup 1999, playing a big role in his country´s wins over Samoa, Japan and Ireland. His try vs Japan was the highlight of the match and Pichot went on to score a good scrumhalves try vs France in the Quarter Final. Argentina won the match 33-12 vs Japan in Cardiff´s Millenium Stadium six days after defeating Samoa 32-16 in Llanelli. The quality of the video is not the greatest but it is the best avaliable.

Agustín Pichot´s try in 2007 Top 14 Final

Three months before the kick-off of Rugby World Cup 2007, Stade Français took on Clermont Auvergne in the Top 14 Final at the same venue as the sports showcase tournament´s opening fixture - the Stade de France. The match marked history with a foreign player, Agustín Pichot, captaining a team to glory in French rugby. Pichot´s try in the 68th minute was the first of the match and proved to be the turning point in the final as Clermont had been leading 15-9 with Australian Brock James responsible for all his teams points thanks to his goalkicking. The try  was a great way of showing kids the art of the scrumhalf position as Pichot bossed around his forwards to advance with the players doing what they were told. At the same time he remained in constant contact with his flyhalf and with Stade Français four metres from the try line and looking dangerous Pichot sold a dummy pass to his flyhalf which Clermont bought 

Pichot was joined by three fellow Pumas in the Stade Français team that evening. Rodrigo Roncero and Pedro Ledesma were the teams starting props and Juan Martín Hernández was the flyhalf. There was a forth Argentine in the team with the Argentine-Italian, Sergio Parisse coming off the bench in the secondhalf. Clermont also had three Argentine players with Mario Ledesma starting at hooker and Martín Scelzo at tighthead prop and backrower Gonzalo Longo entered the match as a secondhalf replacement. 

Hernández was the player of the match and was in the best form of his career he landed the conversion to put Stade Français in the lead. Clermont reclaimed the lead with James landing his sixth penalty but it was to be Stade Français´day as Hernández threw a long cut out pass to Australian international Radiki Samo who dived over in the corner. With Hernández´s conversion, the Parisians claimed the title with a 23-18 victory.

For complete highlights of the match see here.

La Plata to host a leg of IRB World Sevens Series

The Estádio Ciudad de La Plata, located in the capital of Buenos Aires province, La Plata is proving to be the unofficial new home of Argentine rugby. The stadium will host Argentina´s home international vs the All Blacks this year and according to key sources the venue will host a leg of the IRB World Sevens Series starting in 2013. With a capacity of 53,000 and state of the art facilities the venue is fast becoming Argentina´s premier stadium and doing so while Buenos Aires is going without matches. Thir is true in soccer as much as rugby as it hosted the final of the 2011 Copa America. 

At a conference in Buenos Aires yesterday organized by Agustín Pichot it became clear that the IRB has confirmed and will soon make it official that La Plata will host a leg of the IRB World Sevens Series in 2013.  It is a part of the extension which is underway that will see Tokyo host a leg this coming weekend. The inclusion of La Plata means that now every continent will now host at least one leg. The IRB´s region of the Americas will have two with Las Vegas, Nevada hosting the other. The new stadium in La Plata has, therefore, been favored over the option of Mar del Plata which has made an official bid for the event.

Amongst other details to emerge from the conference was the UAR´s push for an Argentine team to enter Super Rugby. The idea being for Los Pampas XV, reinforced with star players based in Europe, to play Super Rugby. The IRB has been wanting Argentina to creaet a domestic professional competition, somehting that Pichot says Argentina is not suited to. For the time being, at least, it would not be likely to be the best path to take.