Nick Mallett praises his side after Italy’s impressive bonus point victory over Russia - Rugby
Italy’s national rugby union team’s head coach, Nick Mallet, has praised the offensive skills displayed by the Azzurri’s in their bonus point win over Russia in their 2011 Rugby World Cup (RWC) pool encounter.
Italy thrashed Russia 53 – 17 in their pool C encounter at Trafalgar Park, Nelson on Tuesday, September 20. 12 tries were scored in the match, out of which Azzurri’s scored nine while the spirited Bears scored the remaining scores.
Mallett has expressed his confidence in the Italy’s try-fest, particularly after a disappointing build up to the RWC and their poor 2011 Six Nations tournament, in which they managed to just score six tries in whole tournament.
Mallett said, “We were able in this game to play more attacking rugby than we do in a whole Six Nations. Often, the time when we play the Six Nations games, we don't have as much ball, we don't have as much go-forward ball, we don't have as many opportunities
to offload as we did today.”
Italy scored five of their nine tries in the match within the first 30 minutes of the game. For Italy, Sergio Parisse, Giulio Toniolatti, Tommaso Benvenuti crossed the try line in the 5th, 13, 22nd, and 15th minute of the
game. Italy’s fifth penalty inside the first half an hour of the game was a penalty try.
Mallett termed his team’s effort to win their Try Bonus Point inside the first 30 minute of the game as “fantastic performance”. He has expressed his satisfaction with his team’s results at the scrum. He went on to state his displeasure at giving away an
easy penalty and on the fact that his team let the Bears to score three tries easily.
Commenting further Mallett added, “You're playing against sides that are very good, and we've got to be very careful that we don't concede tries through our mistakes.”
In an interview to ITV4 after the match, Azzurri’s captain Parisse admitted the flaws in their defence, which helped the Russians to score their first ever try in the RWC. He also hailed the Bears performance in the match.
Italy has two more game to play against the USA Eagles and Ireland and they need to put up a strong performance to give them a chance of reaching the second round of the 2011 RWC tournament.
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