WALES head coach Wayne Pivac has laid down the law to Leon Brown and told the Dragons prop he must take his chance to impress when he makes a rare start against Argentina on Saturday.

Tighthead Brown, 24, will win his 20th Test cap in the second of the back-to-back meetings with the Pumas in Cardiff and he has been a regular in Wales squads since 2017.

But he has made only two starts in that time with his third set to come this weekend. With his best players on the British & Irish Lions tour of South Africa, Pivac is looking at the next generation.

He has made seven changes to his team for their Argentina rematch with Brown one of them. Wales’ scrum struggled badly against the Pumas as the two teams shared a 20-20 draw first time around. “It’s not a reflection on last week’s form at all,” Pivac insisted when asked about front-row changes. “On the tighthead side, both picked up bumps and Leon is probably in the better shape out of the two of them to be quite honest with you. He’ll get a start and that was our intention for this series.

“I thought when he came on, he held the scrum really, really well. There were a couple of scrums where we had Josh Turnbull off the field so we had no flanker on his side.

“He had to dig in and he did. He did a good job. It’s going to be a good opportunity for him to start because he hasn’t started too many Tests.

“If you look back half a season ago, Elliot Dee had 30-odd Test matches but when you sit down and go through it, there were only a handful of starts. I’m really pleased he’s got some starts and those guys get to operate and feel the pressure from the first whistle.

“It’s important Leon does that because Tomas Francis is there to come back in for the autumn, but we will pick up injuries so we need to know the quality of the players in behind.

“We’ve tried to explain to the boys that it’s a huge opportunity for them to show what they can do not only in games, but in training too.

“A lot of information goes in here and it’s a pressure environment. If we learn that someone is not quite up to it, then that’s a good thing as well because you don’t want to be throwing someone who is not quite ready into one of the autumn games against the All Blacks or South Africa.

“This is the perfect series for us with a number of players unavailable to get a whole lot of learnings very, very quickly.”

Nicky Smith and Dillon Lewis started as the Welsh props in the Argentina draw with Lewis yellow carded for his struggles at the scrum. Argentina dominated both there and at the contact area.

Brown will come in for Lewis as one of five Dragons in Pivac’s starting line-up.

Dee continues at hooker with Ben Carter and Will Rowlands the lock pairing once again. Ross Moriarty is at No 8 with flanker Taine Basham on the bench. Aaron Wainwright is injured.

Ospreys loosehead Gareth Thomas joins Dee and Brown in holding up the scrum.

Dragons try machine Jonah Holmes drops out of the side with rookie Tommy Rogers returning on the wing. There are also starts for Cardiff trio Tomos Williams, Jarrod Evans and Turnbull.

Former Dragon Nick Tompkins partners captain Jonathan Davies at centre.

“Jonah has had two of the three games and we’ve looked at him in club football,” said Pivac. “It’s definitely not an injury. Now it’s an opportunity to have a look at Tommy against a tier one nation.

“Regardless of what happens this weekend, there have been players who have put their hand up and given us the belief we’ve got more depth in certain positions.

“It’s been a very worthwhile exercise and what we want to do as a group is sign off with a very good performance against a good tier one nation.

“We’re rugby people and there is a match to be played which we want to win.”

Wales side to face Argentina at Principality Stadium on Saturday (kick-off 3pm): Amos; Lane, Tompkins, Davies (capt), Rogers; Evans, Williams; Thomas, Dee, Brown, Carter, Rowlands, Turnbull, Botham, Moriarty.

Replacements: Parry, Jones, Lewis, Screech, Basham, Hardy, Sheedy, Halaholo