Los Pumas will face the All Blacks on Friday at 4 pm in one of the Semifinals of the Rugby World Cup to be held at the Stade de France, and there are several players who are part of the national team who already know what it means to beat New Zealand.
The history shows that Los Pumas and New Zealand have faced each other 36 times in their history and that only the national team managed to win twice: in November 2020 and in August 2022.
The Pumas players who were present in one of those victories and will face the All Blacks again in the semifinal are: Julián Montoya, Francisco Gómez Kodela, Agustín Creevy, Guido Petti, Matías Alemanno, Marcos Kremer, Rodrigo Bruni, Nicolás Sánchez, Santiago Chocobares, Santiago Carreras, Gonzalo Bertranou, Lucio Cinti, Thomas Gallo, Joel Sclavi, Tomás Lavanini, Juan Martín González, Matías Moroni, Emiliano Boffelli, Juan Cruz Mallía, Eduardo Bello.
This means that 20 out of the 23 players who will face this elimination round already know what it means to beat the All Blacks: the only four who were not present in any of the victories are: Facundo Isa, Lautaro Bazán Vélez, and Mateo Carreras.
The starting lineup for Los Pumas that defeated the All Blacks in 2020 with the 25 points scored by Nicolás Sánchez: 1. Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro, 2. Julián Montoya, 3. Francisco Gómez Kodela; 4. Guido Petti, 5. Matías Alemanno; 6. Pablo Matera (captain), 7. Marcos Kremer, 8. Rodrigo Bruni; 9. Tomás Cubelli, 10. Nicolás Sánchez; 11. Juan Imhoff, 12. Santiago Chocobares, 13. Matías Orlando, 14. Bautista Delguy; 15. Santiago Carreras.
The starting lineup that defeated New Zealand for the second time in 2022: 1. Thomas Gallo, 2. Julián Montoya (C), 3. Joel Sclavi; 4. Matías Alemanno 5. Tomás Lavanini; 6. Juan Martín González, 7. Marcos Kremer, 8. Pablo Matera; 9. Gonzalo Bertranou, 10. Santiago Carreras; 11. Lucio Cinti, 12. Matías Orlando, 13. Matías Moroni, 14. Emiliano Boffelli; 15. Juan Cruz Mallía.