SO MUCH was promised, so little delivered. This was supposed to be Argentina’s big opportunity, but brave talk beforehand of gate-crashing Australia’s World Cup party proved to be mere empty words.

In a way, however, they were beaten before they started, not so much by Australia, but by technology. For this World Cup a new software package has been developed that has provided the International Rugby Board and its referees with the means of analysing where and why individual countries tend to concede penalties.

Details of the past 50 awarded against every team have been fed into a computer. The results give an instant breakdown to which referees can refer in the build-up to a match. In short, they are better prepared and know what to look for. The danger is that it may lead to referees officiating according to their perceptions rather than what they see with the naked eye.

In Argentina’s case, their tricks of the trade in the scrum would appear to have been exposed. At four of the first nine scrums Paul Honiss, the New Zealand referee, awarded free kicks against them, primarily for failing to engage straight. They became increasingly frustrated and wary of further infringement. With their forwards emasculated, Argentina had nowhere to turn.

Yet that was only part of their problems. You had to feel sympathy for Mario Ledesma, the experienced hooker, and one of the leading lights of World Cup 1999. In the Telstra Stadium in front of a crowd of 81,350, he suffered rugby’s equivalent of the yips. Losing nine of your own lineouts at this level, mostly for throwing in crooked, is unforgivable. The harder he tried, the stiffer his arm became. It was as if Viagra had got into his system. Perhaps he was still thinking of the “women of the night” who had greeted the Pumas at Sydney Airport with banners saying: “Fancy a Ruck?” On one occasion, when he did manage to get it straight, he overcooked it and missed his jumpers entirely. As the ball sailed into no-man’s land, Ledesma crumpled to his knees on the touchline, clutching his head in despair. Marcelo Loffreda, his coach, should have put him out of his misery.

Loffreda’s selection of Felipe Contepomi at fly half ahead of Gonzalo Quesada, the leading scorer four years ago, was a mistake. Contepomi may be stronger defensively with the ability to stay on his feet when taking the ball up, but his goalkicking was again erratic. Last year, against the Wallabies in Buenos Aires, he missed seven out of nine penalties; last night another four attempts went begging. No side can afford such profligacy.

Argentina showed themselves to be rugby dinosaurs, which is a shame. They do have talent but are terrified of using it. In the first half, Contepomi received the ball 11 times but failed to pass it once.

For Ireland, it was the best possible result. Neither side collected a bonus point and Eddie O’Sullivan, the coach, will be happier knowing that his side’s lack of scrummaging power is unlikely to be exposed when they play the Pumas in their decisive pool game later this month.