Ireland may be red-hot favourites to make a winning start to their RBS 6 Nations campaign against Italy on Saturday (2.30pm), but coach Joe Schmidt believes the Azzurri will provide formidable opposition in Rome.
Italy’s most impressive results in the competition have come at home, with wins over both Ireland and France in recent seasons, and Schmidt is anticipating Jacques Brunel’s side exploding out of the blocks at the Stadio Olimpico.
“Their home games and their first-up games, they tend to show a lot of energy and endeavour,” Schmidt told RTÉ Sport.
Italy commence their campaign after an encouraging autumn, which saw them beat Samoa and suffer honourable defeats to Argentina and South Africa.
“On the back of the confidence they will have gained during the autumn, where they had the better of Argentina for the bulk of the game, they beat Samoa fair and square, going down very narrowly to South Africa with Bryan Habana scoring virtually in injury-time to make it 22-6, I think it was a very tight game with one of the giants of international rugby, from that perspective they’ll have their confidence,” Schmidt said.
"Their home games and their first-up games, they tend to show a lot of energy and endeavour"
The New Zealander also insisted that Italy’s line-up is a far stronger than the one that was obliterated in Dublin in March, adding: “They’ve got everyone back fit.
“Castrogiovanni came off after seven minutes against us last year. They didn’t have Sergio Parisse, they didn’t have Alessandro Zanni, they didn’t have Edoardo Gori, who has been playing some fantastic stuff.
“Kelly Haimona is giving them probably a little bit more stability and direction than they’ve had in recent times at 10.
“Balanced with the exciting young guys they’ve got like Leonardo Sarto out on the wing and Michele Campagnaro at midfield, and the experience they’ve got out there with Luke McLean and Andrea Masi, they are guys you’d think would be picked based on the fact that they’ve caused a lot of problems for opposition teams.”
Live coverage of Ireland v Italy (Saturday 1430 at Stadio Olimpico) from 1330 on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player.
