'That's the thing I'm most proud about' - Italy fall short in Dublin but make their mark

MAKING THEIR MARK: Italy's Head Coach Gonzalo Quesada takes a selfie with fans after the match. Pic: ©INPHO/Ben Brady.

Italy? Top class to the very end.

And that end point stretched to over an hour beyond the final whistle, to the last seconds of their press conference when, unprompted, captain Michele Lamaro made a point of mentioning Hollie Davidson.

Lamaro, in a language that is not his own, congratulated the Scot for being the first woman to referee a men’s Six Nations game. It was pitch perfect, in tone and in form, and it reflected the best efforts of his team on and off the park all day.

Italy came to Dublin shouldering something new: expectation.

For so long the whipping boys of this Championship, their opening win against Scotland in Rome, coupled with Ireland’s recent struggles, set the scene for what was now clearly their best ever shot at a Six Nations win in Dublin.

They didn’t manage that, but they did enough to frank Rassie Erasmus’ high praise for them last November, and enough to prompt one inquisitor to ask if they could one day aim to actually win this tournament.

Lamaro digested that one and said how, in his first year as Azzurri captain, the questions coming his way were on what he thought about the possibility of Italy leaving the Six Nations. Even he can’t believe how things have changed so suddenly.

He shared how, growing up, he was part of an Italian rugby community that had always been accustomed to propping up the table, or one celebrating when they managed to beat the Scots and maybe finish fifth instead.

“And that's the thing I'm most proud about, having now an 18-year old young kid coming through and thinking, ‘Oh, my God, I'm playing with a bunch of guys that might be able to win the championship one day’.

“Sometimes, you know, it's tough because you find yourself in a tough situation, but you're never a superhero, and you’re never very, very bad. Trusting the process is what you can do to be able to have a little bit of a long-term ambition and little bit of a long term like legacy.”

His head coach echoed much of this.

Gonzalo Quesada found a team and a country lacking in belief when he took over three years ago. He has inculcated a new mental armour and he could talk of pride and satisfaction on Saturday while highlighting areas of improvement ahead of France in Lille next.

Italy are very much a team on the up. As for Ireland, the debate is whether the graph continues to slip, or if they are at a point where they can start to rediscover the heights that were the norm only a few short years ago.

“Teams get constantly ups and downs,” said Lamaro who fully expects Ireland to return to previous heights.

“Ireland obviously lost a little bit of their confidence that they had in the last couple of years and obviously we wanted to take advantage.

“We knew that if we, especially the first 20 minutes, put them under pressure, scoreboard pressure, especially, it would have been very, very difficult for them.

"I've been in that situation before, around mindsets. It's tough because you have to perform.”