THE SUNDAY HERALD REPORTS


Italy 23 - 20 Scotland
By Alasdair Reid at Stadio Flaminio
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IT WAS not towards the famous fountains of Rome that Scotland's travelling supporters were heading last night, but to waterholes that would serve a far more useful purpose. If ever there was a case for obliterating a match from the short-term memory, then this was surely it. There are days when sober reflection just doesn't do the job.

Yet in the cold light of the days ahead, Scotland's players will be obliged to reflect on a result that was not so much handed to Italy as gift-wrapped for their pure enjoyment. Italy coach Nick Mallett admitted to shedding tears after clinching his first victory in charge, but his Scottish counterpart Frank Hadden had plenty of reasons for a good old bawl of his own. Frankly, his side lost a game that was theirs for the taking.

Italy secured it at the finish with a sweetly clipped dropped goal from full-back Andrea Marcato, a 79th minute strike that left Scotland enough time to kick off and precious little else. Such scores can have an achingly dramatic quality, but Marcato's strike was from the drawer marked grimly inevitable'. Scotland had failed to nail the game down in the third quarter, and everything that happened after that suggested it was slipping further and further away from them.

If there was anything good to say about Dan Parks' performance, it was only that the Scotland fly-half made his opposite number Andrea Masi, a man who has all the playmaking skills of a garden gnome, look halfway decent in the position. On a day of Scottish generosity, Parks displayed the philanthropic instincts of a latter day Andrew Carnegie, producing a stream of errors throughout the game. The most significant of those were the intercepted passes he threw to set up both Italy's tries, quite an achievement for a player whose late introduction to the side had been seen as a conservative move by Hadden.

The match could scarcely have provided a more glaring contrast of fortunes than that between Parks and his half-back partner Mike Blair. As captain, Blair's leadership must be questioned after a match that, frankly, he allowed to slip away, but his own playing contribution was immense. You wonder what Blair could do in the context of a better side, although that question now seems almost certain to be answered on the Lions tour next year.

Few other Scots would seem to merit that honour this morning. Euan Murray did his best in a creaking scrum, Alasdair Strokosch continued his impressive run of form and Scott MacLeod was the best lineout forward on the pitch. There were even some decent displays along the backline, where Graeme Morrison again showed he merited his promotion to the full Test side. But somehow the whole was never the sum of its parts, the collective effort never quite as impressive as the individual.

Sergio Parisse was a standout for Italy, but theirs was far more of a team effort than Scotland's. "My players never stopped working from the beginning of the championship," said Mallett at the finish. "I am very pleased for them."

For all that the game had pace and no little excitement, though, there was no mistaking that it was still a wooden spoon decider. Indeed, about the only consolation for Hadden at the finish was that he was able to hand that item over to Italy, their margin of victory being two points short of the figure that would have kept it in the Murrayfield trophy cabinet for another year. But as the jubilant Italian players danced on the Stadio Flaminio pitch at the finish, they did not seem particularly bothered by the sheer ignominy of it all.

As the Italians beamed at their fans, Parks wore a rather different expression. As well he might, for any review of the match will be a painfully difficult experience for the player. In fairness, it was only on Friday that he was drafted into the starting XV, but it was still a calamitous performance by a man who is not exactly short of experience in the Scotland No 10 shirt.

The first of his significant errors was made in the 11th minute, when he wafted a pass towards the left touchline, where it was gathered gleefully by Kaine Robertson, the Italy wing. Robertson hacked ahead, earning a scrum when Chris Paterson was forced to carry over. When the first scrum collapsed, referee Nigel Owens fingered Scotland as the culprits; when the next one went down he arced to the posts to award a penalty try.

With Simon Danielli already off with an injured ankle, the soothsayers who had earlier spotted that the match would take place on the Ides of March seemed to have a point. However, Scotland regrouped, recovering with a try by Ally Hogg soon afterwards, a deliciously scooped pass from MacLeod giving the flanker his chance to steam over the line.

Parks and Marcato exchanged penalties, but Scotland seemed to waste a chance when, awarded another near the Italy line, they chose to kick for a lineout. Even so, they moved further ahead just before half-time when Blair, who had tried a couple of breaks earlier in the game, scampered away untouched from the Italy 22 and dived between the posts for his score.

That should have put the wind in Scottish sails. Instead, they seemed inhibited in the early stages of the second half, and Italy began to grow in confidence.

Just before the hour mark, they found their reward in the shape of another Parks pass, an effort that was plucked from the air by Parisse who set off on a 40-metre run down the right touchline. Parisse's inside pass looked suspiciously forward, but centre Gonzalo Canale seized it on the bounce, racing the last 20 metres for his try.

That brought Italy to 17-17, parity being maintained by another penalty exchange. But Italy had the go-forward at last and they worked their way deep into Scotland's half. Eventually, the ball was spun back from a ruck, finding Marcato ideally placed to apply the killer touch. And he had the precision that too many Scots lacked.

Italy: A Marcato; K Robertson, G Canale, M Bergamasco, E Galon; A Masi, S Picone; A Lo Cicero, L Ghiraldini, M Castrogiovanni, C Del Fava, M Bortolami, J Sole, A Zanni, S Parisse. Subs used: F Ongaro, S Perugini, C Nieto, J Erasmus, P Travagli, E Patrizio.

Scotland: H Southwell; S Damielli, S Webster, G Morrison, C Paterson; D Parks, M Blair; A Jacobsen, F Thomson, E Murray, N Hines, S MacLeod, A Strokosch, A Hogg, S Taylor. Subs used: S Lawson, A Dickinson, C Smith, J White, K Brown, A Henderson.

Referee: N Owens (Wales).

This article was posted on 16-Mar-2008, 20:10 by Hugh Barrow.