Ireland beat Italy to keep faint title hopes alive

Men's Six Nations

Italy (10) 17

Tries: Ioane, Varney Cons: Allan 2 Pen: Allan

Ireland (12) 22

Tries: Keenan, Sheehan 3 Con: Crowley

Ireland held off a spirited Italy to secure a bonus-point win in Rome and keep alive their faint hopes of winning a third consecutive Six Nations.

Hugo Keenan's first-half score and Dan Sheehan's hat-trick ensured a win that took Ireland to 19 points in the table, three clear of France and four ahead of England.

Italy scored tries through Monty Ioane and Stephen Varney, but paid the price for ill discipline, with Michele Lamaro sin-binned just before the break and Ross Vintcent shown red in the second half for a high hit on Keenan.

After Sheehan's hat-trick score put the visitors 22-10 up, Stephen Varney's try raised Italy hopes of a rare win over Ireland, but the home side's late pressure failed to yield a winning moment.

Wales face England in Cardiff at 16:45 GMT before leaders France welcome Scotland to Paris at 20:00.

An England win would take them top of the table as they have a superior points difference over Ireland.

But victory for France would almost certainly secure them the title given their vastly superior points difference over England.

With their title hopes hanging by a thread and arriving in Rome on the back of a humbling defeat by France, captain Caelan Doris said Ireland needed to finish the campaign with their "best performance".

But this did not come close. Against France, Ireland dominated the opening 20 minutes without scoring a point. Here, they started ponderously and Italy took advantage, constructing a beautiful opening try after 12 minutes.

In-form centre Tommaso Menoncello broke through a couple of tackles and offloaded to Paolo Garbisi, whose perfectly weighted grubber kick was dotted down by Ioane.

Italy could have scored a second try a few minutes later had it not been for a knock-on following another impressive Menoncello surged through the Ireland midfield.

After that let-off, Ireland got their act together somewhat, and after the TMO ruled out a Finlay Bealham try for the prop's double movement, Jack Crowley sent Keenan through for the Ireland opener.

It did not quite open the floodgates. Instead, Garry Ringrose - back from suspension - was caught offside and Allan nailed a long-range penalty to put Italy 10-7 ahead.

But Italy lost forwards Dino Lamb, Sebastian Negri and Lorenzo Cannone to injury in the first half and their cause was not helped when squad captain Michele Lamaro, who had been dropped to the bench, was sin-binned for deliberately knocking the ball out of Jamison Gibson-Park's hands at the back of a ruck.

Lamaro was furious with himself and Italy's woes only deepened when Ireland immediately pounced through Sheehan to lead 12-10 at the break.

Italy: Allan; Capuozzo, Brex (capt), Menoncello, Ioane; Garbisi, Page-Relo; Fischetti, Lucchesi, Ferrari; Lamb, Ruzza; Negri, Zuliani, L Cannone.

Replacements: Nicotera, Spagnolo, Zilocchi, N Cannone, Lamaro, Vintcent, Varney, Marin.

Sin-bin: Lamaro (40), Nicotera (80)

Red card: Vintcent (56)

Ireland: Keenan; Hansen, Ringrose, Henshaw, Lowe; Crowley, Gibson-Park; Porter, Sheehan, Bealham; Ryan, Beirne; Conan, Van der Flier, Doris (capt).

Replacements: G McCarthy, Boyle, Furlong, J McCarthy, O'Mahony, Murray, Prendergast, Aki.

Referee: Luke Pearce (Eng)