Dan Sheehan scored a hat-trick as Ireland overcame a sloppy start to keep alive their hopes of retaining the Guinness Six Nations title with a unconvincing 22-17 bonus-point success over Italy.
Seven days on from having their Grand Slam dream crushed by a 42-27 Dublin drubbing at the hands of France, Simon Easterby's side scraped to victory in Rome to move top of the championship table ahead of Saturday's other matches.
