CAELAN DORIS insisted that a clash with the Azzurri must be the red letter day for Ireland after last week’s Les Bleus bashing.
Ireland face Italy in the Stadio Olimpico in Rome tomorrow in a game that has an anti-climatic feel to it after Grand Slam hopes were quashed last week by France.
A Championship win is a long-shot – Ireland would need to win well and then hope England fail to get a bonus point win against Wales, and France lose to Scotland.
But that has not stopped a record Six Nations travelling support of over 25,000 Irish fans descending on the Eternal City for the bank holiday weekend.
And Doris insisted that the team must bounce back quickly from last week’s 42-27 loss to France, and make sure that loss is the start of something special.
He said: “It was obviously a big defeat that takes away our Grand Slam hopes.
“With any big defeat you want to learn and want to have it as a growth ultimately in the long-term. I hope we can take lessons into this weekend but also in the long-term.
“We’re not where we want to be consistently at all yet and there is still so much growth that we really need to chase that down. So I hope that it’s going to add to the group long-term.”
Doris also insisted that the clash is not an anti-climax for the team, who have secured the Triple Crown.
And he pointed out that the fact that it is the last time the current squad will be together with Peter O’Mahony, Conor Murray, and Cian Healy (who travelled but is not involved) all retiring from international rugby after tomorrow.
He said: “Given the three lads finishing up, obviously last week was very disappointing and it changes the nature of the end of it.
“But for us it’s still about finishing with our best performance, the rest is out of our control.
“But the three lads, what they’ve contributed, the group we have, we really want to finish with our best performance yet and that’s been a key theme through the week.
“We’re getting excited about a special weekend over here with our best performance yet in front of, I believe there are 25,000 or 30,000 Irish travelling over, which will be incredibly special.”
