Dan Sheehan scored a hat-trick as Ireland scraped an unconvincing 22-17 bonus-point success over Italy before their hopes of a third consecutive Guinness Six Nations title were wiped out.
Seven days after their Grand Slam dream was crushed by a 42-27 Dublin drubbing at the hands of France, Simon Easterby’s side stuttered to victory in Rome to move top of the table ahead of Saturday’s other matches.
