Coach Nick Mallett saw enough in Italy’s bonus point 27-10 win over USA to convince him that his side have what it takes to beat Ireland in their crunch Pool C encounter this weekend.
The Azzurri ran in four tries to the USA’s one to leave them level on ten points with Australia ahead of their winner-takes-all clash with Ireland this Sunday.
Captain Sergio Parisse, Luciano Orquera and Martin Castrogiovanni all touched down for the Italians whose total dominance in the scrum also earned them a penalty try in the second half to give them the all-important bonus point.
And Mallett was adamant afterwards that the Azzurri, who now only have five days to recover before the Ireland game, will need to continue to dictate at the set-piece to stand a chance of a famous victory.
“The most important thing for us first of all is to check on our injuries and make sure everyone’s Ok because we’ve only got five days now until our next game,” he said.
“There was quite a tense build-up to the USA game, we have a lot of respect for them and what they’ve done in this tournament, they really played hard against Ireland.
“And they did really well against us as well but we had one major advantage in the scrum and as a team you have to play to your strengths.
“It may not have been as open a game as the spectators would have liked but that’s the way it goes sometimes, we have got a better front row than Ireland so we need to recover and do the same this weekend.”
USA full back Chris Wyles added all ten points for the Eagles who midway through the first half had levelled the scores at 10-10 but they ran out of steam in the second half in the face of an increasingly dominant performance by the Italian scrum.
