From 'Roman Holiday' to 'Roman Disaster'

RUGBY:ITALY WOKE up yesterday morning to a new, widely unexpected miracle. Italy's 22-21 win over France at the Stadio Flaminio on Saturday, only the second time that Italy had defeated France and the first time in a Six Nations tie, inevitably prompted no small amount of media hyperbole: "One small point for the rugby player, one giant leap for Italian rugby", commented sports daily, Corriere Dello Sport, in a paraphrase of astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous words during his July 1969 moonwalk. "Unbelievable, We Wipe Out France", headlined rival sports daily Gazzetta Dello Sport.

Words like “historic” and “dream” were working overtime in all the media headlines as Italian rugby joyfully embraced a win which came on the eve of next Thursday’s celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the Unity of Italy. This latter point was underlined by the presence on the Flaminio pitch of Anita Garibaldi Jallet, great granddaughter of Italian patriot and liberator Giuseppe Garibaldi: “What could be better, just five days away from the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of Unification? In the post-match rejoicing, we even had Anita Garibaldi, dressed in red, to present the trophy to the azzurri.”

On the purely rugby front, much attention was focused on Italian winger Mirco Bergamasco, the player whose successful penalty kick five minutes from time had put Italy in front in a game in which at one point they had trailed by 6-18. Perhaps referring to the front page headline in last Saturday’s French sports daily L’Equipe, which read “Roman Holiday”, Bergamasco revealed that this less than flattering French media view has served as a motivating stimulus: “We didn’t much like certain words in the French papers, especially when you think that, for years now, they have questioned our right to be in the Six Nations,” said Bergamasco.

Not surprisingly, that headline came back to haunt the French. Within minutes of the final whistle, online French rugby buffs had renamed the game “Roman Disaster”.

There was no happier person at the Flaminio than Italy’s South African coach Nick Mallet, who said: “This is my biggest win ever as a coach. I am more proud of this success than of all those with Stade France and with South Africa. If you leave aside our (heavy) defeat to England and look at our three home games, well we’ve won one and lost the other two (to Ireland and Wales) only because of small details.”

Winning Italian captain Sergio Parisse, whilst obviously delighted, kept his feet firmly on the ground: “This is a dream that has become reality, a victory for passion.”

French coach Marc Lievremont, whose position may be in doubt, admitted: “The Italians won because they were united. I am not sure if you could say the same about us.”

The final word on a victory that may well have important positive repercussions for Italian rugby goes to Rome daily La Repubblicawhich underlined the impact of the result in a country where sporting passions are dominated by the round, not the oval ball: "Anyone who truly loves sport and who forms part of a proud minority, knows only too well that you can wait all your life for days like this But when they finally arrive, they light up everything".