Italy were scoring points at a rate of one a minute – at least for the first three minutes – after an early penalty for offside showed that Scotland were continuing their trend of ill-discipline into this round four match in the sunshine of Rome.
In truth neither side looked particularly confident, with several early penalties given away by Scotland at the breakdown, often being over-exuberant in their efforts to protect isolated ball carriers from being turned over.
When Scotland did finally make their mark on the game, it was a beauty. George Turner made up for his earlier penalty with a bullocking run down the right hand touchline before feeding it inside to Price. Darcy Graham recovered the ball as it spilled backwards and Finn Russell arced a pass towards the opposite touchline. It looked like Kyle Steyn might have to work to keep it in play but Sam Johnson plucked it out of the air and dove over.
It looked like Russell had undone all attempts to seize the momentum with an intercepted pass that saw Italy attacking Scotland’s line, but Price read Callum Braley’s pass perfectly and picked it off to send the Italian defence into disarray. At full tilt having made it to around half way, he threw a perfectly weighted pass at full tilt – of the sort that Chris Harris needed a few weeks ago – to Kyle Steyn. The winger found his space closed down by three Italian defenders so he chipped it back towards the middle, into acres of space.
All Chris Harris really had to do was get near the ball to score, which he did.
It felt like a big momentum swing, but Italy were not to be undone just yet and the excellent Braley was rewarded with an Italian try that brought the scores within two points.
Stung, the Scots stormed their way deep into the Italian half with the red scrum caps of Turner and Gilchrist carrying hard. A quick tap from a penalty after another big run by Ali Price – who finally found his break – looked like it might bear fruit until referee Luke Pearce whistled up play after Brex the Italian centre looked like he came out badly from a tackle and was sent for an HIA.
Scotland had a series of scrums and ran a simple set piece move to take a third try and a second for Harris, largely created by the running lines of the excellent Sam Johnson.
Half-Time: Italy 10-19 Scotland
The highlight of the opening five minutes of the second half were a couple of lovely scampering breaks by the skipper Stuart Hogg but as has been his misfortune recently, mainly they ended in tackles or turnovers.
In the end it was a couple of moments of brilliance from that other misfiring genius Finn Russell that secured the bonus point. First a superb offload round the back of the tackle to Sam Skinner to keep the ball alive, then minutes later another half break and a pop pass into a gap to put Darcy Graham in behind the defence. He had some work to do but his feet were too quick to be denied and Russell slotted the conversion with half an hour to play.
It went a bit quiet after that for ten minutes, but on the hour mark Ali Price showed that the resurgence of he and Hogg was completed, with the ball looking a little static after a quick throw by Graham until the scrum-half stopped crabbing and set off through a gap like a hair before stepping inside and throwing another pinpoint pass (with a hint of lateral about it) to the skipper who sprinted over for the fifth try. To add insult to Italy’s injured pride, Russell then slotted the touchline conversion.
A try by the baby-faced winger Capuozzo on his debut gave Italy rare second half points in the tournament and joy for the home fans, and spurred their team on to a strong spell where they defended everything Scotland threw at them and worked back into Scotland’s half for a series of five metre lineouts.
Kyle Steyn, who offers a measure of stability in a back three that is usually more comfortable in attack than defence, bundled his man into touch and Scotland broke back up the field.
With five minutes to play, Hastings and Vellacott upped the tempo significantly off the bench and while there were too many small errors to add further points, Italy finished the stronger with a second try for Capuozzo that deservedly took the gloss off Scotland’s win; credit for that should go to the home side.
While Italy might now fancy their chances against Wales, Scotland face the daunting prospect of a visit to Dublin to finish the tournament…
Referee: Luke Pearce
Player of the Match: Johnson, Turner, Graham, Darge and Steyn were all good but it was Ali Price. By a mile.