Italrugby crushed in Cardiff after feat with England

The Six Nations 2026 of the’Italrugby. The Azzurri, after a thrilling domestic success against England, al Principality Stadium of Cardiff were crushed 31-17. Quesada’s men had the first chance to unlock the score at the 12′ mark, but Paolo Garbisi failed to hit the posts from the pitch. Instead, it was Wales who struck first: at 15′ Aaron Wainwright went in goal and Dan Edwards converted for 7-0. The match finally split just before the half-hour mark, with a deadly one-two by the Welsh: Wainwright’s second personal goal came at 26′, imitated at 29′ by Dewi Lake. Edwards was accurate in both transformations, and at halftime the scoreboard read 21-0 for the hosts.

Andrea Gussoni

In the second half, the Azzurri reaction was expected, but it was still Wales that sank the blow: at 44′ Edwards signed the fourth goal that also secured the offensive bonus and converted for 28-0. A few minutes later, at 48′, Edwards himself also scored a drop that brought the score to 31-0. Italy found a jolt at 52′ with a goal by newcomer Tommaso Di Bartolomeo at the end of an action that also cost a yellow card to Archie Griffin. From the penalty spot Garbisi shortened it to 31-7, but the Blue did not take advantage of numerical superiority to really open up the game again.

The second Italian goal came at 68′ with Tommaso Allan, but Garbisi did not convert and the score remained at 31-12. As time expired, it was Garbisi himself who found another score, too late, however, to hope for a bonus or a comeback: the conversion failed and the match ended 31-17. In the final, two goals were also disallowed to the Azzurri (one to Monty Ioane and one to Leonardo Marin) after the TMO review.

“It&#8220s hard to talk in the heat of the moment,” Gonzalo Quesada admitted, “but we think we did as little as we could during the week because we knew it was going to be tough physically, they also had an extra day of rest, but most importantly we missed some tackles that we normally don”.

“There were two historic wins at home with Scotland and England and a very interesting game in Ireland. Today Wales deserved more than we did, but at least we fought until the end. We were not the kings of rugby last week and it is not that we are not worth anything today: it was still a good Six Nations and there is still a lot of work to be done”, concluded the coach.