Italy skipper Michele Lamaro described their first win over Wales as 'unreal' as they stunned Wales 22-21 at the Principality Stadium to record their first Six Nations victory for seven years to end a run of 36 successive losses in the competition
Sunday 20 March 2022 13:15, UK
Michele Lamaro described Italy's incredible Six Nations victory in Cardiff as "unreal" while Wales skipper Dan Biggar said the performance was "simply not good enough".
Edoardo Padovani scored a late try as the visitors stunned Wales 22-21 to secure their first win in Cardiff and end their 36-game losing streak in the competition on Saturday.
Italy clinched a spectacular triumph a minute from time when full-back Ange Capuozzo attacked from inside his own half, and Padovani claimed a try that Paolo Garbisi converted to spark wild scenes of Azzurri celebration.
Lamaro told BBC Sport: "We deserved that, we worked so hard to get here but this is the first step of a process we just started. It's unreal. That last try was amazing.
"Being in the moment until the end is what has taken us to the win. The important thing was to concentrate on our process, that was the key thing for us."
Last season's champions had hoped to give milestone men Biggar and Alun Wyn Jones a day to remember.
Skipper Biggar became the seventh Welshman to collect 100 caps, while Jones clocked up 150 Wales appearances, making him the first player in international rugby union history to reach that figure.
But the script was torn up by an Italian side that claimed a first Six Nations victory for seven years that ended a run of 36 successive losses in the competition.
Biggar said: "What do you say? This is probably the toughest interview I've ever had to do. Simply not good enough, so many facets of the game. We haven't played well all day, but not to finish it off when they are 70 metres from our own line...
"We've just said in the huddle it's probably the last chance for a lot of players. We weren't at it from the get-go and we got punished. We were well short on work ethic and that's got to be looked at very closely."
Wales coach Wayne Pivac bemoaned his side's indiscipline after their first defeat in history to Italy.
He said: "We conceded 12 points through ill-discipline in that first half and we left a couple of tries out there. We weren't accurate in that first half, to get back in the lead and then throw it away is very disappointing.
"We didn't get an 80-minute performance and we'll review that clearly. We'll go away, make sure we learn from that and about the players.
"We knew coming in it was going to be a tough competition. That's how it's turned out. We've improved throughout the competition, but today we let ourselves down."
"They've got to enjoy this, they're a young crew. They need to learn how to win, and they’ve done that today. We had some measures we were going to measure ourselves by, not the results, and this gives us a base going forwards now. We want to build on what happened today and then move into November."
Italy bullied Wales at the breakdown and put in a stout defensive display, something that had been a weakness in recent years, to secure one of the more famous wins in their rugby history and show their continued improvement under coach Kieran Crowley.
"I'm just really proud," said Crowley. "They were out on their feet in the last 30 minutes but they just dug in and kept believing.
"They stuck at it and now they won't be saying we've lost 36 Six Nations games in a row, or whatever it is. We're happy about that.
"There were a lot of emotions [at full-time]. Marius Goosen our defence coach has been with us for six years and he hadn't experienced a Six Nations win - now he has. There are a lot of emotions."
