Italrugby, Gonzalo Quesada announces 15 for Six Nations debut

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The 15 Azzurri ahead of the Six Nations debut

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Gonzalo Quesada, Technical Commissioner of the Italian Men&#39s National Team, has made official the lineup of Italy that will face Scotland at the Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh on Saturday, February 1 at 2:15 p.m. local (3:15 p.m. Italian) in the match valid for the first day of the Guinness Six Nations 2025.

It will be match number thirty-eight between the two teams, the nineteenth in Scotland: the tally è of twenty-eight wins for the Highlanders and nine Azzurri victories, the last one last March when Michele Lamaro lifted the “Cuttitta Cup” which, on Saturday, will be back up for grabs between the two National Teams to celebrate the memory of Massimo Cuttitta, historic captain of Italy and coach of the Scottish forwards.

The wide triangle chosen by Quesada è the same one announced at the 2024 Nations opener (which then saw the last-minute entry of Pani into the starting XV in place of Capuozzo) with Tommaso Allan, the Azzurri with the most caps in active duty and the best Italian scorer in the history of the Tournament, deployed at fullback along with wingers Ange Capuozzo and Monty Ioane.

Confirmed the pair of centers formed by Brex – author of a try and named Guinness Player of the Match last year in Rome against the Scots – and Menoncello, MPV of the 2024 Tournament, with Quesada entrusting the keys of the halfback to Paolo Garbisi and Martin Page-Relo.

The third line will find space for the same players who took the field two years ago with Lorenzo Cannone number 8, captain Lamaro and Sebastian Negri flanker. In the second line, along with Federico Ruzza, will be Dino Lamb who will make his debut in the oldest rugby tournament in the world. Up front Fischetti, Nicotera and Ferrari will lead the Azzurri scrum. 

On the bench, the rookie Rizzoli è ready to collect his first cap. In addition to the Roman pylon in force at Zebre ready to take over in the running game Lucchesi, Riccioni, Niccolò Cannone, Zuliani, Vintcent, Alessandro Garbisi and Simone Gesi who found his first and only cap with Italy just against Scotland at Murrayfield two years ago.  Along with the 23 players on the competition list, Di Bartolomeo, Zilocchi, Favretto, Varney and Marin will also leave for Scotland.

This is the lineup that will take the field:

15 Tommaso ALLAN (Perpignan, 81 caps)

14 Ange CAPUOZZO (Stade Toulousain, 23 caps)

13 Juan Ignacio BREX (Benetton Rugby, 41 caps)

12 Tommaso MENONCELLO (Benetton Rugby, 23 caps)

11 Monty IOANE (Lyon, 35 caps)

10 Paul GARBISI (Toulon, 42 caps)

9 Martin PAGE-RELO (Lyon, 13 caps)

8 Lorenzo CANNONE (Benetton Rugby, 23 caps)

7 Michele LAMARO (Benetton Rugby, 43 caps)– captain

6 Sebastian NEGRI (Benetton Rugby, 58 caps)

5 Federico RUZZA (Benetton Rugby, 59 caps)

4 Dino LAMB (Harlequins, 9 caps)

3 Simone FERRARI (Benetton Rugby, 59 caps)

2 Giacomo NICOTERA (Stade Francais, 28 caps)

1 Danilo FISCHETTI (Zebre Parma, 47 caps)

Available

16 Gianmarco LUCCHESI (Toulon, 28 caps)

17 Luca RIZZOLI (Zebre Parma, rookie)

18 Marco RICCIONI (Saracens, 30 caps)

19 Niccolò CANNONE (Benetton Rugby, 47 caps)

20 Manuel ZULIANI (Benetton Rugby, 27 caps)

21 Ross VINTCENT (Exeter Chiefs, 9 caps)

22 Alessandro GARBISI (Benetton Rugby, 13 caps)

23 Simone GESI (Zebre Parma, 1 cap)

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