Peter Jackson: Sometimes, the rugby law is an ass

Referee Nika Amashukeli shows a red card to Epalahame Faiva of Italy during the Guinness Six Nations Rugby Championship match between Ireland and Italy at the Aviva Stadium.

There are 60 million people in Italy and the minority with a passing interest in the Sei Nazioni will have gone to bed last night condemning it as a bad joke.

As an exercise aimed at taking the sport out of its largely English-speaking straitjacket, Italy’s fate will have served only to dissuade a legion of new fans from any further attempt to understand what on earth was going on.