Rugby union fans caught between the Olympic clay pigeon shoot-out in Beijing and the 'turkey shoot' between the Springboks and Argentina on Saturday suffered something of a nailbiter. They were left desperately flicking between TV channels trying to match Olympic trap skeets with points against the poor old Pumas.

At a rate of nearly a point a minute, it was rough on the old telly trigger finger - and worse for the pride of South American rugby union. The Pumas were well and truly whipped, 63-9.

Rugby union fans the world over have been left questioning the status quo within the IRB and the health of the sport in general when the No.1 ranked team beats the No.4 so emphatically. This obviously is not good for rugby. And to make matters worse, this was a Bok 'B' side!

Don't cry for Argentina, though - that's not going to do them any good. They urgently need to slot into competitive tournaments like the Six Nations or Tri-Nations, in order to have any hope of keeping pace with the big dogs of international rugby. The big dogs in Johannesburg this Saturday were the Boks and they left the Pumas looking like puppies. Embarrassing really, a pleasure for only the most sadistic fans of the sport. It reached a point when the referee was questioning a second 'almost' try for the Pumas that everyone was saying, go on ... errm, just give it to them already.

But a hand up and not a hand-out is what is required. Los Pumas will become the 'Lost Pumas' within the international game and go the way of the Incas and Aztecs if they are left in isolation - and the Kiwis and Aussies are going to have to join South Africa and step up to the plate on this one.

The IRB has got to do something - and fast. The gap is widening and eventually we might find a rift like that between rugby league and rugby union between teams within international rugby union.