Italy 12 Scotland 29

An impressive performance by fullback Brendan Laney steered Scotland to their first-ever Test win on Italian soil as they beat the Azzurri by 29-12 in the Lloyds TSB Six Nations clash in Rome.

The New Zealand-born fullback -- known as "Chainsaw" -- scored 24 points to help give Scotland the victory, their first of the 2002 Championship.

Laney's form with the boot seems to have finally solved one of the great problems facing coach Ian McGeechan in recent seasons, the absence of a genuine international class goal kicker.

The No.15 was only handed the responsibility after Scotland's nominated kicker Chris Paterson flunked an early shot at goal, but once he had slotted his first penalty in the 18th minute, Laney never looked back.

Indeed, the confidence he demonstrated in his kicking seemed to translate to the rest of his game, with a late try providing the knockout blow to fell Italy.

With just two minutes to go of the contest, Scotland effected a turnover on the right of the pitch, enabling Townsend to fling out a wide pass left to his backline.  Laney came into the line at pace, transfixing the Italian defence with a delightful dummy and then accelerating on an arching run to score a well-taken try.

That try was definitely the highlight of a fairly unstructured, dour match that saw the referee hand out three yellow cards handed out for indiscipline.

While there was no lack of passion on display at Stadio Flaminio, this clash had the unmistakable air of a bargain-basement, wooden spoon dogfight, with neither side possessing the necessary skill levels to match their ambition to play a wide-ranging game.

An eventful first half saw both sides manufacture a series of gaps in the opposition defence but all too often the try went begging through errors, both sides having to rely instead on the sharpshooting skills of Diego Dominguez and Laney for any points.

With the score poised at 9-all at half-time, Dominguez and Laney scoring three penalties apiece, Scotland began to get into their stride for the first time in the match, holding onto possession for long stretches and asking questions of the Italian defence.

But, as in Paris a fortnight ago, the turning point in the match for Italy was an act of indiscipline by one of their forwards as Santiago Dellape took a swing at Jason White in an off-the-ball incident in the 50th minute.

After an intervention from the touch judge, Dellape duly trotted off to spend ten minutes in the sin-bin but, more crucially, this enabled Laney to level the scores to 12-all.

A further Laney put Scotland further ahead a few minutes later and then Scotland fly-half Gregor Townsend seized an opportunity to put some daylight between the sides.

Townsend took advantage of some lax Italian handling by replacement centre Luca Martin to intercept and race 40 metres for a crucial try.  With Laney on hand to provide the conversion, Scotland at last looked ready to make history.

With Laney having the last word in the 78th minute, Scotland sealed the victory and will now look forward to their next encounter -- against Ireland at Lansdowne Road -- in good heart.

Man of the Match
There are only two candidates for this award and both of them were wearing Scottish jersies.  Gregor Townsend's interception struck a telling blow against Italy, but it was fullback Brendan Laney who earns the accolade, having scored 24 of his side's points.  As well as showing great form with the boot, Laney also scored an excellent individual try to finish off the Azzurri.

Villain of the Match
A bit harsh to single out Santiago Dellape for this award considering that the punch that earned him his second-half sin-binning was hardly a Martin Johnson-like haymaker and was only thrown in retaliation for an elbow in the face from Scotland backrower Jason White.  But the Italian lock's indiscipline cost his side the lead and restricted them to 14 men during a crucial period in the match.

Moment of the Match
Has to be Brendan Laney's cheeky dummy before he cruised in for his second-half try.  With Chris Paterson seemingly ready to explode onto the pass, the Italian defenders took their eyes off the Scotland fullback for a crucial few seconds -- enough for Laney to retain the ball and accelerate over for the try.

The teams:

Italy:  1 Giampiero De Carli, 2 Alessandro Moscardi (c), 3 Federico Pucciariello, 4 Carlo Checchinato, 5 Santiago Dellape, 6 Mauro Bergamasco, 7 Marco Bortolami, 8 Matthew Phillips, 9 Alessandro Troncon, 10 Diego Dominguez, 11 Denis Dallan, 12 Mirco Bergamasco, 13 Cristian Stoica, 14 Roberto Pedrazzi, 15 Paolo Vaccari
Reserves:  Andrea Lo Cicero, Luca Martin, Mark Giacheri, Alejandro Moreno, Aaron Persico, Ramiro Pez
Unused:  Juan Manuel Queirolo

Scotland:  1 Tom Smith, 2 Gordon Bulloch, 3 Mattie Stewart, 4 Stuart Grimes, 5 Scott Murray, 6 Andrew Mower, 7 Jason White, 8 Simon Taylor, 9 Bryan Redpath (c), 10 Gregor Townsend, 11 Glenn Metcalfe, 12 Andrew Henderson, 13 James McLaren, 14 Chris Paterson, 15 Brendan Laney
Reserves:  George Graham, Martin Leslie
Unused:  Jon Petrie, Graeme Beveridge, Duncan Hodge, Kenny Logan, Robbie Russell

Referee:  Deaker k.

Points Scorers

Italy
Pen K.:  Dominguez D. 4

Scotland
Tries:  Laney B.J. 1, Townsend G.P.J. 1
Conv:  Laney B.J. 2
Pen K.:  Laney B.J. 5