‘Get back here Diego’ - the Argentinian media reaction

Argentina’s elated players had barely left the field on Sunday before Argentine sports daily Olé was issuing orders. “Get back here Diego!”

its website screamed after the Pumas’ 43-20 pummelling of Ireland in the Millennium Stadium.

After attending his country’s victory over Tonga in the pool stages, the soccer legend had promised to return to England if Los Pumas made it to the semi-final. Have no doubt this most patriotic and superstitious of fans will heed the summons and be in Twickenham on Sunday.

All Argentina was buzzing after this victory. The emphatic early-morning win over the reigning European champions had everyone scrambling for superlatives: Gigantic. Momentous. Historic.

“If you want it, if you desire it and think it, it is possible,” wrote Olé’s correspondent Maxi Friggieri from Cardiff. “If you don’t think so ask these Pumas, who travelled to British lands with the idea of making history and are already part of it. Because not only are they in the last four of a World Cup for the second time, but they reached it with a beautiful game plan. Yes, beautiful. Dynamic, offensive, typical of the powerhouses. Because Argentina exists and is this now, a rugby power.”

This theme of a nation not just having arrived as a genuine rugby power but doing so playing with real flair, was everywhere. ‘With courage, but also with talent’ read the headline on Tucuman’s La Gaceta.

Under a photo of Juan Imhoff’s swallow dive try (in Argentina called ‘the little dove’) Mariano Ryan in Clarín wrote: “It is time to give huge applause to a great team. Because the Pumas left the best side in Europe by the wayside playing at times high-flying rugby. That’s how they qualified and now they’ll be going for even more.”

Whether in victory and defeat, Argentina’s sports-writers pay little attention to the performance of their opponents and instead focus obsessively on that of their own ‘pibes’, or kids. But in his report Señor Ryan did mention Ian Madigan’s missed second half penalty as one of the match’s key moments.

But there was no mention of Ireland’s absences as he identified Argentina’s “fundamental victory in the duel at the breakdown for securing their passport to the semi-finals” heaping praise on huge performances by the Pumas backrow with flankers Pablo Matera and Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe named “victory’s standard-bearers”.

In rival paper La Nación Alejo Miranda singled out the entrance of Facundo Isa on 51 minutes as “vital for recovering control of the game” when Ireland edged within a penalty kick of levelling the score.

“His carries of pure potency served to win metres and at the same time recover some serenity at a time when the backs could not find any spaces.”

Most encouragingly for Miranda was the ability of the younger players to step up in a match in which their “physically diminished” captain Agustín Creevy had less influence than expected: “As well as playing well, a team full of youngsters demonstrated an amazing maturity.”

If no-one seemed bothered to mention the impact Kiwi legend Graham Henry has had on Argentina’s set-up in recent years there was plenty of praise for coach Daniel Hourcade who tugged at a nation’s heart-strings by tearing up in his post-match interview when dedicating the win on Argentina’s Mothers’ Day to his sick mother watching back home on the telly.

“For us it is a joy because it is the type of game that we want, that we like, with which we well most comfortable. In this tournament it’s been demonstrated that it is southern hemisphere rugby that prevails,”

said the man from the rugby-mad province of Tucuman. “The dream continues. Now we’ll go for the lot, without a doubt.”