South Africa cruise to Rugby Championship title after inflicting revenge on Argentina

The back-to-back world champions eased to their first title since 2019

South Africa eased to a first Rugby Championship title since 2019 with a convincing 48-7 victory over Argentina in Nelspruit.

Los Pumas kept their hopes of winning the tournament alive when they edged world champions South Africa 29-28 last week to temporarily deny the Springboks their first title in five years.

However, there was never any danger of a repeat - with the back-to-back world champions simply too good.

Springbok full-back Aphelele Fassi started them on their way to victory after six minutes, dotting down after running a devastating line.

The Springboks had their second shortly after, with influential flanker Pieter-Steph du Toit somehow grounding the ball after diving over the top of Argentina fly-half Tomas Albornoz.

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Albornoz would be responsible for Argentina's response - being on hand to finish off a line-break under the sticks.

However, that fightback was short-lived. A penalty from Jaden Hendrikse extended the home side's lead, before Mateo Carreras was sent to the sin-bin after taking Fassi out in mid-air recklessly.

The full-back dusted himself down from that incident to cross for his second score just after the half-hour mark, before Cheslin Kolbe crossed for their fourth with his usual mix of deft footwork and power.

The second-half was not as eventful, with the main flashpoint being Argentina back-row Pablo Matera being sent to the sin-bin for making head contact with Vincent Koch - an incident that was later upgraded to a 20-minute red card.

He would be joined on the sidelines by full-back Santiago Carreras, after he was yellow-carded for a deliberate knock-on - leaving Argentina with just 13 men in the latter stages of the second-half.

With that, the Springboks ran riot. A driving maul saw Malcolm Marx get over, before a Kurt-Lee Arendse had a try chalked off after he couldn't quite ground a cross-field kick after a flowing move from deep.

The disappointment wouldn't last, with a mazy run from the winger laying the groundwork for du Toit's second try.

Minutes later, Jesse Kriel latched onto Handre Pollard's kick behind to cross for South Africa's seventh try.