O'Sullivan calls for lively Ireland performance

Ireland head coach Eddie O’Sullivan insists his players must be “active” with the ball if they want to beat Argentina today.

After yesterday’s training session, O’Sullivan highlighted the need for focus in order to make as few mistakes as possible.

“We’ll have to be active with the ball and obviously to start playing our own set-pieces against them, being solid,” the coach commented.

“Argentina are very dangerous on the counterattack and broken play.

“We’ve trained very well. Sessions have been very positive, productive.”

The current squad is very different to that which played this year’s Six Nations and finished runners-up, and O’Sullivan’s ethos has changed appropriately.

“The policy for the Six Nations was to put the best team out for all of the games, and this is an opportunity to move players around and give them chances and they will have a new opportunity next week,” he added.

O’Sullivan insisted that even if Ireland beat Argentina in Santa Fe, there will be many changes ahead of the second Test, in Buenos Aires a week later.

He is keen to look at his entire 30-man squad, and insists up to 50% of the squad for this autumn’s World Cup is yet to be decided.

“I already said I would try as many players as I could and that is still the situation,” he said.

“There will be quite a few changes next week.”

O’Sullivan expects “a great atmosphere” in on Saturday and insisted his expectations are high ahead of the match.

He added: “I want a good performance, that’s the key. We’ve had a very good week’s work.

“I expect everybody at the stadium will be Argentinian, so the question for us is can we deal with it and not feel intimidated?

“They have an advantage in home support. That’s an element for the game.”

Felipe Contepomi appears to be the dangerman for Ireland.

The Leinster player is set to feature at fly-half according to the starting XV revealed by coach Marcelo Loffreda – but O’Sullivan is not so sure.

“I don’t know if he will play 10 or 12, despite the team saying he would play 10,” he said.

“He is a very good footballer, we’ve seen him at Leinster. We know him better than anybody, probably even better than people in Santa Fe. And he knows us very well too.

“His style is very good. He will be a big influence in the game, as he is very experienced as a national team player, especially when playing with his country at home.”