PARIS, 3 September - Argentina captain Agustin Pichot and his team-mates are aiming to break a run of unsuccessful starts in the IRB Rugby World Cup.

Pichot, playing in his fourth world cup, will be taking the field in the opening match of the tournament for a third time.

On both previous occasions he has been on the losing side - against Wales in 1999 and Australia in 2003.

"We have five days so we'd better arrive in the best way possible to change the result in our favour," the 33-year-old said.

Pichot is thrilled to be playing host nation France in the opening match.

"I have a number of friends in the French team and I know how excited they are to play in front of their home crowd," he said.

"The most important thing is to enjoy it. I love playing rugby, I love what I do and it will be a good event for everyone and rugby deserves it."

Pichot is well aware of the challenge facing Argentina in advancing to the quarter-finals, with Triple Crown winner Ireland, and France, ranked third in the world, the major threats in their group.

"We have a very tough pool, we have two very tough countries we are playing against (France and Ireland), and the other two countries (Namibia and Georgia) we don’t know about," Pichot said.

"We have to be very intense in how we play the games."