Ireland got their series in Argentina off to a good start with a 29-17 win in Resistencia, but have a few injury concerns ahead of next weekend's match in Tucuman. Luke Marshall and Conor Murray are in doubt, while Jonny Sexton should recover.
Argentina scored the first try of the match when Manuel Montero was put in space and finished brilliantly, but a Chris Henry try shortly afterwards saw them lead 11-10 at the break. Sexton scored shortly after the break following a lineout steal from debutant South African, Robbie Diack.
Ireland added to their total around the hour mark as wing Andrew Trimble intercepted a long pass. Sexton converted the try but soon went off and was replaced by Ian Madigan, who added two penalties to put the Six Nations champions out of reach. Tomas de la Vega scored a consolation try.
"It was very hard going, we knew it was going to be physical which it was," said skipper Paul O'Connell. "We didn't know we were going to be as inaccurate as we were. We put a lot of balls down and missed some tackles.
"They put us under a lot of pressure, I think the result is great but the performance is disappointing.
"You look at what England did going down to New Zealand putting in a big performance against them, that’s what we needed to do and we didn’t do that. This gives us something to work on now and something to review over the next few days and knowing Joe Schmidt it will be a very tough review and hopefully our performance will improve next week."
Marshall suffered concussion, his fourth in 12 months, so will need to be assessed before the 2nd Test. Scrumhalf Murray suffered a dead leg, while Sexton has recovered from a knee cramp.