Ten points in the space of 10 minutes has given Ireland renewed hope of reaching the last four of the Rugby World Cup, having gone into half time 20-10 behind against Argentina.

It was the South American side who settled quicker, as Joaquin Tuculet superbly collected a high ball from the back before offloading to Matias Moroni to burst down the right and touch down for the opener.

Huge gaps were already beginning to appear in the Ireland backline, which their opponents again exposed when Juan Imhoff chased down Santiago Cordero's chipped pass to touch down right on the line to put Los Pumas in early control.

Things got even worse for the Six Nations champions soon after, with Tommy Bowe being stretchered off and Nicolas Sanchez kicking over three more points to leave Ireland with an early mountain to climb.

That created a 14-point margin with just 14 minutes on the clock, meaning that Joe Schmidt's men would need to equal a World Cup record if they were to overturn the deficit.

A rare error from Argentina soon after gave their opponents real hope, though, as Ramiro Herrera charged into Keith Earls to earn himself a yellow card, and in those 10 minutes Ireland were able to open their account through Ian Madigan's close-range kick.

While Argentina did manage to keep their tally ticking over via the boot of Sanchez, coming after some Chris Henry ill-discipline, the northern hemisphere side cut the deficit right in half thanks to Luke Fitzgerald's score.

The replacement cut inside from the left, dodging one tackle and crashing over to restore hope among Ireland's strong home contingent in the Welsh capital.

With Argentina now back to full strength, having conceded 10 points while down to 14 men, the momentum remained with the Green and Whites who were unable to further pile on the pressure before the break due to Madigan's penalty crashing back off the left upright.