The All Blacks have made a statement in their 2023 season-opener, ruthlessly dispatching Argentina 41-12 victory at Mendoza's Estadio Malvinas Argentinas.
Building towards this year's Rugby World Cup in France, New Zealand will return home from South America with their perfect record in Argentina intact - they have still never lost to Los Pumas in Argentina.
Coach Ian Foster's side ran in seven tries to claim a bonus-point win, sitting second in the Rugby Championship table on points differential, after the Springboks opened their season with a huge win over Australia.
In a frenetic start to the first half, Argentina came within a whisker of scoring from the kickoff, when Pablo Matera charged down Damian McKenzie's attempted clearance.
Making just his third start in the No.10 jersey at test level, McKenzie got back in the knick of time to stop Argentina taking the lead. After that, the first half was one-way traffic, as the All Blacks ran in five tries without response.
Surprisingly named to start in the No.2 jersey, Dane Coles justified his selection with the opening try, on the end of a free-flowing move, sparked by debutant Emoni Narawa on the right flank.
Minutes later, the All Blacks were in again, when Ardie Savea grabbed the second, before brothers Beauden and Jordie Barrett combined on the left wing for a third try inside the first 15 minutes.
Although Argentina stopped hemorrhaging points, the half-hour mark saw the All Blacks in again, as Rieko Ioane slipped through Los Pumas' defence to make it four.
The worst was still to come for Argentina, as Aaron Smith scored with the final touch of the first half, with No.8 Rodrigo Bruni shown a yellow card for repeated infringements.
For a side that could have trailled 5-0 early, a 31-0 lead was ample reward for the All Blacks' display.
To their credit, Argentina stepped up their performance in the second half to at least give a soldout home crowd something to cheer about. A sustained assault on New Zealand's tryline saw prop Lucio Sordoni put them on the board, only for their try to immediately be cancelled out.
Despite his initial struggles, McKenzie found his feet at first-five, as a slaloming run sent Beauden Barrett over in the corner, but the tries dried up in the second spell.
After moving to fullback to accommodate Richie Mo'unga off the bench, McKenzie set up Chiefs teammate and debutant Narawa close to the end of normal time, giving him a try in his first taste of the black jersey.
Argentina had the final say, when stalwart hooker Agustin Creevy went over from a lineout drive, but it was nothing more than a consolation effort in an otherwise routine All Blacks victory.
The results sets up an intriguing clash against archrivals South Africa, who opened their Rugby Championship campaign with an emphatic 43-12 win over Eddie Jones' Australia.
What's more, the Springboks side that took the field in Pretoria was by every metric a second-string outfit, as they opted to send their best and brightest to New Zealand early to prepare for next Saturday's clash at Go Media Stadium Mt Smart.
Meanwhile, Argentina will look to rebound against the Wallabies, when they travel to Sydney next weekend.
All Blacks 43 (Coles, Savea, J.Barrett, Ioane, Smith, B.Barrett, Narawa tries; McKenzie 3 conversions) Argentina 12 (Sordoni, Creevy tries; Boffelli conversion)
